Asphodel Meadows
by Hinn-Raven
Summary: After leaving Blood Gulch for the last time, a mishap with Wyoming's time travel unit sends Tex years into the future, on a strange planet called Chorus.
1. Prologue: River Styx

Tex woke up.

She wasn't expecting that.

The last thing she remembered was the explosion, Andy cackling gleefully as fire and light filled everything. She remembered Gamma crying out and Junior screaming. She remembered moving towards the kid, and then…

Nothing.

She shot up, reaching for her gun, all of her senses on high alert. But there was nothing.

Wherever she was now, she was alone. There wasn't even any sign of the ship, let alone the other people who'd been on it.

"Fuck," she muttered, looking around. She didn't recognize the landscape; it was far too picturesque to be Blood Gulch, she was sure of that. Tex had spent so much time in that shithole that she'd be able to recognize it under any circumstances.

Wherever she was now, she was far away from everything.

" _Damn it_!" She scowled, looking for something to punch. Unfortunately, she was in the middle of a clearing, without so much as a rock, let alone a convenient Red.

There was nothing but grass, stretching out in all directions. In the distance, she thought she spotted the rough rise of a mountain, the spire of a tower, and a patch of darker green that indicated the possible presence of trees. The ground she stood on was rough dirt beneath the tall grasses.

There was a deep imprint in the earth, as if she'd landed here at great velocity. A quick check of her armor confirmed that her back was covered in the same dirt. She'd have to clean it later, when she was under cover, not in the open.

She took a deep breath, trying to steady herself. Her emotions were warring with each other; confusion and rage and adrenaline all trying to take control.

She needed to find Church. She would get back to Blood Gulch, and figure out what happened, and hope that everything was fine. That somehow Omega's plan had worked, and the war _was_ over, and Freelancer wouldn't be able to hurt Church using it as an excuse.

He wouldn't understand, but he'd forgive her. She knew that much. It would take time, but he'd forgive her. She knew that like she knew her own name, like she knew his. He'd gripe about it, complain about it, bring it up in arguments years from now, but he'd forgive her in the end.

She nearly activated her invisibility, but she paused. She didn't know where she was, and she probably should conserve power. She didn't have Omega to run everything anymore; and although she'd gotten pretty good at running it herself, she'd rather not run low when she needed it.

She checked her radar, and, not finding anyone nearby, picked a direction at random, and walked towards it.

Find civilization. And then find Blood Gulch.

She could do this.

* * *

The first town she found was abandoned. That was worrying.

What was more worrying was the date on the newspaper that she found.

"That can't be right," she whispered, staring. She wasn't sure what the exact date was supposed to be, but she definitely _hadn't_ been lying in that field for over a year and a half.

But she knew what Wyoming's ability was, and she knew how finicky Freelancer armor enhancements could be, especially if something was happening with the AI—and Gamma certainly wasn't in the best state of mind when Andy had done his best to kill them all. What couldn't say that time travel _wasn't_ actually possible, just like the Reds' ridiculous theory? Although she liked to think her logic was sounder than theirs had been.

She pushed aside that thought. She didn't miss those losers. She was Texas, a certified badass, and she didn't _miss_ people.

She found an internet connection, and went digging, desperate for answers. She was even further in the future than she thought; it had been three years since she'd left the Reds and Blues behind.

She threw all the furniture in the abandoned house, smashing them into pieces systematically. It was like Omega all over again. She couldn't think of anything except how much she wanted to break every single thing on this stupid planet.

Three years.

Church must have thought she was _dead_. She screamed in frustration. Presuming he was still alive, that was. Three years, without her to keep an eye on him. Three years, and she wasn't even sure if the war was over. What if Freelancer had come back for him? What if they'd cut him apart again, trying to make more weapons?

She'd like to think that Tucker and Caboose would try to stop it, but they didn't know what she knew, and anyways, if it was official orders from Command, they probably wouldn't protest.

And even if they hadn't started hurting him again, historically, Churches hadn't taken the deaths of Allisons very well. She didn't know what Church would have done.

There were so many gaps in her knowledge, and it set her teeth on edge. She stood there, in the middle of that abandoned house, surrounded by splintered furniture and ruined electronics, and strode out to find another house with a computer so she could learn more.

For some reason, all of the information she could find was old when it comes to galactic news. Local, she found newer things—there was some sort of civil war on this planet, which, she was frustrated to discover, seemed to be on the ass-end of _nowhere_. And, infuriatingly, the opposite ass-end of nowhere than Blood Gulch, which would make her journey back there even more complicated.

The capital of the planet was called Armonia. She figured she'd head there, see if she could find a ship. Hopefully, for once, she'd have luck on her side, and find someone who could tell her where Church was.

She closed her eyes, allowing her awareness to sink into the electronics. It had been a while since she'd try to be Beta, and it was incredible. Everything around her shifted. Some things became heightened, others dulled. It was _right_ , in so many ways.

Something was _wrong_. The radios felt off—jammed, she decided, almost completely. Which was strange. Something was blocking communication on this planet, filling the entire planet with what felt like a low level hum.

She frowned again, and pulled herself back into her own body.

She still didn't know what was going on. Something was wrong on this planet, and it bothered her like a phantom itch.

She turned back to the computer again, and kept looking.

The Great War was over—that was a relief—and Freelancer, from the look of it, was destroyed. She breathed a sigh of relief. Church was safe. The Director couldn't touch him. But she did take note that there was a standing order to arrest any agents of PFL.

But that did mean she had to be careful. Carefully, she went over her armor, being sure to remove anything that might differentiate her from a normal UNSC soldier. The hardest part, she knew, would be her invisibility. She'd have to be careful about using it.

She kept moving.

One foot in front of the other.

Tex was lucky she was an AI, otherwise things would have been even more complicated than they already were. There was little food to be found in this wasteland, and although she took whatever she found in hopes of being able to use it to bargain a ride off this fucking planet, she wasn't feeling too optimistic.

She wasn't good at scavenging. Which irritated her, because she was good at pretty much _everything_.

Admittedly, she'd only tried a handful of things, most of which tended to boil down to kicking ass.

She hadn't seen anyone since crashing. She'd found bodies, she'd found abandoned settlements, she'd found the wreck of a few ships, but nothing that indicated the presence of anyone _living_.

She made sure to keep her rifle nearby at all times. She didn't like this at all.

Her HUD told her exactly how many days had passed on this planet, exactly how many steps she'd taken, and exactly how few people she'd met.

Zero.

It was like this entire planet was abandoned, but that couldn't be right. Entire swaths of it were torn up like a battlefield, entire towns were ruined piles of bombed out rubble. She passed mass graves and burned forests and strange alien sites that were pocked with craters and mine fields.

Tex frowned, running her hand along the length of one of the temples. It reminded her, in some ways, of a herding strategy. Driving everyone into concentrated areas, making sure there weren't any stragglers.

She sighed at her own paranoia. Whoever was running the civil war here probably wasn't doing any of this on purpose. War was long and bloody and costly. She probably was in what had once been a valuable piece of territory before they destroyed it.

She'd been on the planet for almost a month before she finally found people.

Gunfire was almost music to her ears when she heard it. Her head snapped up, and she turned on her invisibility, creeping towards the noise to investigate. She climbed up a pair of steps in severe disrepair, and found herself on top of a building, overlooking a badly damaged street.

The scene below her could be called a massacre if Tex was feeling kind.

She wasn't really.

There was a single attacker—a man in Locus armor with what looked like an entire arsenal strapped to his back, and he was attacking what appeared to be a couple of skinny kids in armor.

There was no way those were real soldiers—they were _tiny_ , and their screams were painfully high and young.

Tex wasn't actually sure if she'd ever met a child before. Theta was probably the closest she'd gotten.

But it didn't mean she was inclined to let a bunch of them get slaughtered by some jackass on a power trip.

Sighing, she decloaked before drawing her rifle. "Hey cockbite!" She leapt down to his level, moving between him and the armored 'soldiers'.

"Who are you?" He growled.

She smirked at him behind her helmet. "None of your business." She aimed and fired.

He was fast, she'd give him that. He picked a shotgun as his weapon of choice as he moved towards her. That was a mistake—Tex had been learning to avoid that particular weapon for the better part of five years.

She grabbed it with her right arm and shoved it aside, causing it to discharge harmlessly against a wall, and kicked him right in the chest.

"Get out of here!" She yelled at the kids, who were terrified enough of either her or their would-be-killer to scramble away, some of them still screaming in a way that almost reminded her of Donut.

"You will regret this," the man snarled.

"Doubt it. I rarely regret anything. Kicking your ass probably won't even make the top hundred."

The hand that wasn't holding his shotgun pulled out a pistol and tried to shoot her. Ambidextrous then. Not bad. Tex threw herself forward, sending them both toppling to the ground, but pushed herself into a somersault so she rolled over him.

He tried to draw back, clearly hoping distance would give him advantage, but Tex charged, slamming her fist against his helmet.

"You know, I really hate assholes who kill kids," Tex decided out loud. "Honestly. I'm not a nice person, but wow, that's just a dick move."

"I am a soldier," the guy snapped. Ooh, she'd clearly hit a nerve there.

"Please." Tex laughed. "Doesn't mean you can't be a dick." She slammed her foot against his midsection, savoring every second of it. It had been _so long_ since she'd fought someone, and her mind was shooting off in all directions, coming up with creative ways to kick this guy's ass.

"The cavalry is here!" Tex blinked in shock as the kids from earlier rounded the corner, holding what appeared to be a machine gun between them.

Tex hit the deck just as they started firing. The armored man did too.

"This isn't over," he growled at her before vanishing from sight.

Tex stared at him. "Oh you fucking _did not_!" She leapt forward, punching the air where he had been. " _Damn it_!"

"Yeth. He doeth that thometimes," one of the kids appeared at her side.

"You all good?" Tex asked, choosing to ignore the lisp. She glanced at them.

There were ten of them, all in matching armor that didn't fit them very well.

"We're fine, mith! What about you? I've never theen thomeone who wasn't Felix fight Locuth before!"

"Please," Tex said. "Takes more than someone like that to scratch my armor." But why he had an invisibility armor enhancement worried her—as well as why someone with that kind of skill was going after a group of barely armed, barely trained teenagers. "What's your name?"

The girl saluted in a way that was so terrible it physically pained Tex to see. "Private Katie Jensen of the New Republic, at your thervice!"

"Don't salute me, I'm not in your army," Tex said, frowning.

"You're not?" Jensen seemed shocked. "But, but, you saved us!"

Tex shrugged. "I was in the area. Heard shouting. Decided I didn't like the look of that guy's face."

"You're not a Fed, are you?" One of the others asked timidly.

"Don't even know what that is, kid," Tex said. "I'm new to this planet. My ship crashed a while back and I've been trying to find civilization ever since."

"Well, isn't that a story we don't hear nearly often enough."

"General Kimball!" The kids all yelped, quickly throwing themselves into a mass salute that closely resembled .

"What's your name, stranger?" The woman wore the same armor as the kids, but hers fit better, and there were light blue streaks on it. Behind her was a man in orange and grey armor, who actually seemed to hold himself like he knew what he was doing.

Tex didn't even hesitate. "Allison Houston. Guess you're in charge around here."

"You're with the UNSC?" The woman asked, clearly hoping.

Tex shook her head. "Used to be, but I've gone freelance since. Security work, retrieval, bodyguard, that sort of thing."

The woman seemed interested. "You fought off Locus," she said.

"I think your privates scared him off with that big gun of theirs," Tex said.

"Still. You stopped him from massacring another one of my patrols."

"Eh. They were the first people I'd seen in a while. Seemed like it'd be hard to ask them for directions if they all were dead."

"Directions to where, exactly?"

"I'd say the nearest spaceport, but given the state of most of the ships I've seen, I somehow doubt that I'd actually be able to get a ride off this planet."

Kimball nodded. "The Federal Army of Chorus shoots down pretty much every ship that's trying to leave."

Tex sighed. "Figures. Don't suppose there's another way out of here?"

She knew what Kimball would say even before she said it, and she was surprised to find that she wasn't particularly opposed to the idea.

Fighting was all Tex knew. The war outside was over, and Freelancer was gone. Church was as safe as he would ever be, and it wasn't like she was going to be able to get to him anytime soon.

This might be interesting.

"Why don't we talk back at our base?"

"Are you sure?" The orange man said, finally speaking up. "We don't know anything about her."

"I highly doubt the Feds would bother to hire someone good enough to fight off Locus, and then try to use her as a _spy_ , Felix." Kimball said.

Tex grinned behind her helmet. She liked this Kimball.

She'd figure out the rest of it as she went.

* * *

"Hey Aly," Felix said cheerfully, gun casually slung over his shoulder. Tex rolled her eyes. She hated Felix, but then again, she hated most people on some level.

She tried to tell herself that this was the reason he made her skin itch in a way that reminded her of the Counselor or the Director. He was a slimeball, but it wasn't like he was going to do anything that would hurt her or hers.

Not that she had anything left to care about. Church was far out of this guy's reach; not that he knew about Church. All he knew was that she was a former UNSC badass-turned mercenary who'd survived a ship crash, and was willing to work for the New Republic in exchange for a ride off this planet when all was said and done. It had been seven months since she'd ended up with the New Republic, and that's all he knew. All any of them knew.

Felix was good, Tex knew, but he underestimated her. Which was good—she wanted him to. She didn't like the way she thought she saw him looking at her—like he was deciding if she was worth the risk. She shouldn't _be_ a risk, not to him. It worried her. Which was why she was trying not to show off, instead doing her work as quickly and efficiently as possible. She got her people out alive, but it wasn't any particular skin off her teeth if she ended up not slaughtering as many Feds as she could have, or if she wasn't seeking out Locus to try to see how many of his teeth she could make him swallow at once.

Felix was good enough that, if she wasn't careful, he could pose a threat. Tex was sure in her abilities, but she wasn't stupidly so. Felix would have been good enough for Freelancer, back in the day. She wondered if the Counselor rejected him, and, if so, why?

"Don't call me that," she said shortly, continuing to stare over the compound. "My name is Allison."

"Allison Houston, yeah, yeah," he said, holstering his gun and joining her by the railing. "You know, I can't find any records of you in the UNSC." He dropped this casually, as if it was a normal thing to run a background check on someone. Maybe it was. Tex didn't have the best grasp of normal.

"That so?" Tex said idly, not looking at him. She didn't like that he was looking for her files. Freelancer would have hid them well, and a fake name and no personal details or combat history ought to be enough to hide her, especially with communication limited as it was. She'd let him come to his own conclusions. But there _was_ a possibility something might turn up, especially if there was an investigation after everything crashed and burned.

She wondered if the Director or the Counselor had managed to talk their way out of it. She hoped not. She spared a thought to imagine those assholes rotting away forever in a ten by ten cell, and she smirked.

"You really enjoy being the woman of mystery, don't you?" He laughed, moving just a bit closer. Tex shifted away, still not looking at him. She knew what he wanted, and that sure as hell wasn't happening. He was charming—an asshole, but charming—but she couldn't trust him as far as she could throw him.

Scratch that, she could probably throw his skinny ass pretty far. Not as far as _Church_ could throw him. That was more like it.

"I don't see how my backstory gets me off this planet any faster," she said.

"I'll give you that. It's pretty terrible!"

"What do you want, Felix?"

"Ah, c'mon Allison. We're the only people in this entire army who are even halfway competent. Can you blame me for wanting a bit of company without having to watch one of those losers accidentally shoot off his own foot?"

"Better than shooting off his teammate's foot," she said idly, thinking of Church and Caboose with a pang of nostalgia. She was glad her helmet hid her smile as she got lost in memories from those days.

She shoved those thoughts aside again. They'd be _fine_. She'd get off this planet, and she'd find them. She'd figure out what came next after that.

 _One thing at a time, Tex_.

"Basic training?" He asked her, not having realized she was lost in thought.

"Yeah," she lied easily. "Idiot couldn't hit a target to save his life, but he managed to nail his squad member's pink toe from halfway across the training grounds." On purpose, too, but she didn't feel the need to tell Felix that part.

Felix burst out laughing. "Oh god, what a bunch of morons! Glad you got out of there, huh?"

"Better company than here."

"Ouch! Allison, my heart is _bleeding_!" Felix staggered dramatically, pressing a hand over his armor. It was on the wrong side to be his heart. He sighed. "Ah well, I'll win you over eventually."

"Doubt it," she said. "Not unless you're willing to let me try out that shield of yours."

"Ha! As if," he chuckled. "You know, Kimball probably could set you up with alien tech like me, if you wanted."

"Alien tech's _never_ worth it," Tex said. "Trust me."

"One day, you'll have to tell me that story, Allison," he said, shaking his head.

She doubted it.

Tex sighed. "I need to talk to Kimball. I think I'm supposed to be taking a squad out for another patrol." She moved away, without so much as nodding at Felix. He cheerfully shouted a goodbye at her back, clearly amused by something.

 _They're going to be fine. Nothing ever happens unless a Freelancer comes looking, and none of the others would have a reason to go to Blood Gulch_ , she reminded herself.

She just wished she could believe it.

* * *

"You won't believe this," Felix said, gleefully throwing the door open in the middle of Tex and Kimball's meeting.

"What is it, Felix?" Kimball asked, slightly annoyed at being interrupted. Behind her helmet, Tex frowned. She wondered what, exactly, made Felix so happy.

"Okay, okay, check _this_ out!" He projected a newspaper headline.

"Colorful Space Marines Stop Corruption?" Tex read, raising an eyebrow.

"That's right! The Reds and Blues of Project Freelancer; a group of the galaxy's greatest soldiers!" Tex felt her eyebrows shoot up towards her hairline as she examined the photo.

There was absolutely no doubt about who it was in the picture. There was Grif, sulking about something to the side. There was Donut, practically leaping into the air, waving at the camera, with Simmons hiding behind him, almost invisible. Sarge was saluting, incorrectly, of course. The Reds were all there.

And for the Blues…

 _Carolina_. Carolina, taller than all the others by a good three inches, shaking the hand of some politician. Carolina, alive and whole and with the Reds and Blues.

 _Washington_. Standing towards the back, radiating awkwardness, hands clasped in front of him, not put off by Tucker's antics.

If Tex had actually needed to breathe, she might have been in trouble. As it was…

Church wasn't there. Tucker and Caboose were standing there—Tucker thrusting his hips in a ridiculous, Caboose facing the wrong way and waving—but Church wasn't.

It took every ounce of self-control she had not to push Felix aside and read every word of the article, searching for answers.

As it was, she reached out with a tendril of herself, and copied the file as quickly as she could, saving it to her HUD.

There was no mention of Church at all. She closed her eyes, barely listening as Felix tried to convince Kimball that they needed to recruit the Reds and Blues to the army.

He was _gone_. She wondered if she'd suspected. If that feeling in the pit of her stomach had been her mechanical body trying to tell her that he was dead.

She forced herself to focus. She didn't have time to mourn. The Reds and Blues were here. She'd make sure they were okay; find out what happened.

Carolina was alive—that was something. And Washington… well, it was always good that more Freelancers weren't dead.

Except Wyoming. Tex _really_ hoped he was actually dead. He better be.

She wondered if Tucker would forgive her for Junior. She wondered if Carolina would shoot her when she saw her. She wondered if they would have the answers she needed.

"I think he's right," she said, which clearly surprised Kimball and Felix. Tex usually made a point of arguing with Felix—mostly because he was wrong more often than not. But this time, she knew the Reds and Blues needed to be brought in. And quickly.

Before she lost track of them again.


	2. Gates of Hades

As much as it pained her not to go storming off to Crash Site Bravo to go get the Reds and Blues back, she didn't argue when Kimball sent her off to gather supplies from a rumored supply bunker. Kimball sent Felix to pick them up instead. Tex was fairly sure Felix was competent enough to bring them back at least. Besides, the army was running low on supplies, and Tex had a better history of making these runs than Felix.

So she picked four soldiers who didn't completely make her want to kill them, and set out.

"Good luck," she said to Felix, nodding to him on her way out.

"That's the first nice thing you've ever said to me," he laughed.

"Hmm. Maybe you're growing on me." If he brought back the Reds and Blues, he probably couldn't be all that bad. Not that she'd trust him. But maybe she'd stop threatening to kill him for everything.

Probably not.

But Tex liked to think she was capable of growing.

The mission was rough and miserable, and the only supplies they managed to get were a handful of strange grenades and enough MREs to last the army another day. Tex stomped into base, cursing and in a terrible mood.

Her mood only got worse when she realized that Felix had been back from his mission for four days.

"What happened?" She asked Kimball, noticing the stress on the other woman's face as she stepped into her office to make her official report.

Kimball ran her fingers through her hair. "There were complications with Felix's retrieval," she said.

Tex's robot body didn't have a real heart, but she thought it stopped anyway. "What?"

"Locus was there."

"Fuck," she whispered. "Did Felix not bring them back?" Every inch of her was screaming for blood. She wanted to track down the mercenary and pull his spine out of his ears, and then beat him to death with it. If he'd hurt _any_ of her boys, she was going to kill him in every single creative way she could possibly think of.

And she was _very_ imaginative when it comes to murder. She'd had years of practice.

"Some of them. Lavernius Tucker, Michael Caboose, Dexter Grif, and Richard Simmons."

"And the others?" Tucker and Caboose were alright. A part of her settled down, but the rest of her still screamed for her to track him down and kill him. She honestly wasn't opposed to listening to it. She'd be doing everyone a favor.

"Captured by the Feds, as far as we can tell."

"Even the Freelancers?" Tex blinked, surprised. Wash might have been towards the bottom of the Freelancers who made the board, but he was still better by far than most of the average soldiers that the Feds would be able to supply. And Carolina… was _Carolina_. There was no way that they should have been able to take her out, unless something was _very_ wrong.

"Freelancer," Kimball corrected. "Apparently Agent Carolina went solo not long after the crash. We haven't heard any reports of her."

Tex frowned, wondering what had drawn Carolina away from the Reds and Blues for so long. She felt a thread of worry bother her, but she brushed it aside. If any of them were capable of surviving Chorus on their own, it was Carolina.

She'd survived being dropped off a cliff after having two AI ripped out of her brain. Compared to that, Chorus was nothing. Tex had other things to worry about right now.

"Better than nothing," Tex said, crossing her arms. "I hope they're worth it."

"So do I," Kimball muttered, rubbing her temples. "So do I."

Tex placed a hand on Kimball's shoulder. "I think you made the right call," she said, before turning to leave.

"I hope so," Kimball sighed before Tex closed the door behind her.

* * *

It didn't take very long to figure out where the newly appointed Captain Tucker was housed. He shared a room with Caboose, but Caboose was currently harassing Grif and Simmons in the armory about something. Tucker, meanwhile, was alone in his room.

Approaching him alone was the best solution. Caboose was too risky, Grif and Simmons too unpredictable. But Tucker?

She could trust Tucker.

He was probably one of the only people still alive she _could_ trust. Church was dead. York was dead.

All she had left were these brightly colored idiots.

And she would rip apart the entire planet to get them back if she had to.

At least she would, if she thought she understood what was going on.

"Tucker," she said, stepping into his room. She hadn't knocked—which, she remembered only too late, usually meant she would have gotten an eyeful, but luckily, Tucker was fully clothed and not doing anything that would make her want to purge her memory banks. _Again_.

"Who are you?" Tucker's helmet was off, and she tried not to stare, even if he couldn't tell, with her helmet hiding her face. It had been almost five years, and she could see them. His dreads were longer now, and he actually looked like an adult, instead of that overconfident kid from Blood Gulch.

If Tex had doubted that she'd traveled in time before now, she had her proof.

"You really need to ask that, cockbite?" She activated her invisibility for the first time in a very long while, savoring the look on his face as she vanished from sight.

"Tex?" He shot to his feet, head snapping from side to side, trying to see her. She deactivated it, waiting for his reaction. He stared at her, mouth gaping. "Holy shit you're _alive_!" He paused, carefully taking a step towards her. "Please don't kill me."

And then he was hugging her. Tex blinked, perplexed.

"What are you doing?"

"Look, you've been dead for five years, I'm allowed to be emotional for like fifteen seconds!" He let go of her and backed up quickly, clearly intending to pretend that had never happened. "Alright, done. What the hell, Tex?"

"Wyoming's time travel unit," she said, carefully setting her trackers so she'd know if someone approached. She didn't want to be disturbed. "I ended up here, two years ago. Couldn't get off planet, couldn't contact anyone, so I joined the cause."

" _You_ joined a cause? Bullshit!"

"I can believe in something!"

He squinted at her. "You're the other mercenary that Felix mentioned, aren't you?"

"Yeah."

Tucker laughed, leaning back, before straightening up again, clearly confused. "Wait, why didn't Felix mention that you were here, then?"

"He doesn't know who I am. I'm Allison Houston as far as everyone here's concerned."

"Seriously? _Houston_?"

"No one's put it together yet," Tex said with a shrug. "I'd really rather not deal with all the problems that come attached to Freelancer." She paused, wondering if she should say the next part. "And I don't trust Felix."

Tucker frowned at her. "What? Felix? He saved us!"

"I know. But I still don't trust him. Which is why you're not going to tell him about me." She cracked her knuckles for dramatic affect.

"Yeah yeah, I get it," Tucker rolled his eyes at her. "Cut down on the melodrama, you're acting like Wash."

"Hey, I resent that. I was kicking ass when that kid was skateboarding down the halls of Project Freelancer."

"Since you're an AI, aren't you technically younger than Wash? And the rest of us, for that matter?" Tucker paused. "Wait, are you telling me Wash had a _skateboard_?"

"And rubber ducks in his locker."

"Ha!" Tucker nearly fell onto his side, laughing. "Okay, when we find him again, I'm _so_ making fun of him for that."

She leaned forward. "So, what happened with you guys? The last thing I remember, the bomb was going off. Now you guys are some sort of big heroes, and hanging out with Wash and Carolina? And where's—" She cut herself off before she could finish.

Tucker's eyes dropped. He knew what she wasn't asking. "It's, uh, a long story."

"How long?"

"Twenty hours or so."

"You have twenty minutes."

"Alright, alright!" Tucker fell back onto his bed. "But don't blame me if you have questions at the end of it."

She laughed softly, and sat down next to him. "Tell me," she said quietly.

* * *

"And then they turn the corner, and Captain Grif shouts, 'Every man for himself!' And then everything falls to _pieces_!"

Tex winced slightly. It wouldn't do Kimball much good to hear that the boys had once been much worse, which was about the only positive thing she had to say about the situation.

"They'll get better," she told Kimball. "They've got a lot at stake here too."

"I'm not sure if that's enough, Allison," Kimball said quietly.

Tex sighed, and reached under the bed, pulling out the bottle of brandy she'd saved for an occasion like this. "Got any glasses? Sounds like you need this more than I do."

"Where did you get that?" Kimball sounded somewhere between accusatory and relieved.

"Found it on a supply run," Tex said, removing her helmet. Felix was off base, so she didn't feel as worried exposing herself. Besides, Kimball had seen her face a hundred times, given that they bunked together. "Figured we might need it."

The body she was in didn't look much like her old one. The face was different, and there was something distinctly electronic around the eyes. Luckily, Kimball believed her when she said they were implants. The hair had been brown, but she'd managed to turn it blonde. It had felt wrong, otherwise.

"For medical purposes," Kimball snapped, but she did manage to scrounge up two cups that could pass for shot glasses if one used creative thinking.

"Destressing the general _is_ a medical purpose," Tex said, pouring them both generous helpings. Alcohol didn't affect her anyways, might as well make sure Kimball could relax.

Tex was surprised by how much she _liked_ Kimball. She didn't exactly have the best track record with other women. Probably the closest thing she had to a female friend was CT, and she'd _killed her_.

But the other woman was tough and competent and fighting a battle she had next to no hope of winning, and she was surprisingly good on top of all that.

And she trusted Tex enough to get stinking drunk in front of her.

"I just—I thought they'd be _heroes_ ," Kimball said, leaning forward, her hair falling in her eyes. "Stupid of me. I thought they could _fix things_."

"No one can fix this mess that easily," Tex said. "I wish they could."

Kimball laughed. "I don't even know what would happen if we _won_. Then what? We've been at war for _years_. We have an army of traumatized kids and no one knows how to run anything and it's been years and no one's come to help us!"

"You'll figure that out when it happens," Tex said firmly. "You're good at this, Kimball."

Kimball burst out laughing, but Tex didn't mistake the shininess in her eyes for a trick of the light. "Alright. Bed time for you," Tex said, shoving Kimball into her own bunk. Kimball had the top bunk, and Tex wasn't willing to try to haul Kimball up the ladder, not when she'd consumed the better half of the bottle.

"We're so screwed," Kimball muttered.

"No, you're not," Tex snapped, rolling Kimball onto her side. "Now sleep."

* * *

Despite her intention to keep her distance, after Tex returned for her patrol, soaked in mud and numb, she sought out Tucker again.

It was stupid and sentimental, she told herself as she made her way to his bunk, but it didn't stop her. Reckless too, if she wanted to keep her cover.

But it had taken her an hour to get the mud out of the cracks in her synthetic skin, and even showering hadn't gotten rid of the feeling that she was moving slower than normal.

She'd almost forgotten what real war was like, before coming to Chorus. War with the Reds and Blues had been potshots and surrenders and the occasional rush of adrenaline when Wyoming made his presence known. Stuff happened, sure, but it was also spread out, with long boring periods of bickering in between.

There weren't breaks on Chorus. It was like being back at Freelancer, right down to the fact that Tex was separate from the rest of them. Back then, she'd justified it to herself, using the Councilor and Director's orders as an excuse to keep her distance. She hadn't known what to make of them; the strange Freelancers who laughed and joked and bickered like family, who swapped stories and gossiped and were friends. She hadn't fit in, and hadn't wanted to until it was too late.

But now, after five years in Blood Gulch, it was hard to go back to being that detached again.

She'd lost two kids that day, and if that wasn't another sign that this war was fucked up, that was it. It felt as if the entire army was made up of children and teenagers, even though she knew that wasn't quite true. So many of them had lost everyone they cared about—and so many more of them were going to die before this war was over.

She knocked on the door to Tucker's room. Caboose was in the dining hall. Grif and Simmons were having a lovely and (very public) lover's quarrel at the training grounds. Tex had been approached by three separate soldiers offering her odds on them getting together. She'd picked the latest possible date; if those two still hadn't figured it out by now, she had no faith it would happen anytime soon, at least not without external interference. And somehow, she was pretty sure that Tucker wasn't about to get his shit together anytime soon for matchmaking to occur.

"Come in," Tucker yelled, and Tex pushed open the door.

"Tex!" He sat upright, grinning. "You're back!"

"Sure am," Tex slipped into the room, carefully closing the door behind her. "What are you up to?"

"You're not interrupting rock time, if that's what you're worried about," Tucker waggled his eyebrows at her.

"Somehow, I don't give a fuck if I'm interrupting that," Tex said, rolling her eyes.

Tucker grinned. "Nah, I was just writing a letter to Junior. I know I can't send it, but I figure, once we get out of here, it'll be nice to be able to show him what I've been up to."

Tex shifted slightly at the mention of Junior. Tucker, oblivious, plowed on.

"Man, he's going to be so excited to meet you! He doesn't remember much from the canyon; mostly just a lot of shouting. But I've been telling him all sorts of stories about his Aunt Tex, and he's going to love actually getting to see you."

Tex stared at him. "Aunt Tex?"

"What? You were dead! Too late, no takebacks! You're an aunt for life. Carolina's one too."

"Tucker, I _kidnapped him_." She really hadn't thought she'd need to spell it out for him.

"Yeah, and that's fucked up, don't get me wrong. But I figured, you probably had a reason. I mean, you're a bitch, but you usually have a reason for being a bitch if it doesn't have to do with, you know, blowing shit up."

Tex was grateful for her helmet, because her expression had to be ridiculous.

"Besides. You're pretty cool when you're not trying to kill me. So it makes awesome bedtime stories for Junior."

"You tell your kid stories about _me_?"

"Hell yeah! His favorite's the one where that version of you that Church made kicked everyone's asses and she wrapped it up with beating Church's face in with his own robotic body."

"That version of me seemed to have a lot of fun," Tex mused to herself.

"Yeah, but I mean, it _was_ kind of fucked up," Tucker said.

"Just a little." The thought of another version of her walking around was creepy—especially since it seemed both very like her, but with significant gaps. Tucker didn't know everything. Tex doubted she'd get real answers until Carolina and Epsilon came back from whatever it was that they were doing.

"You guys really don't handle each other dying very well," Tucker observed.

"Hey, fuck you, I handle it _just fine_."

"Riiiight," Tucker said, giving her a look.

"Fuck you," Tex said without any real feeling.

"Hey baby, whatever you want—" Tex punched him. "Ow! Jeeze, fine, I get it! You don't have emotions!" He paused. "Hey, want to see the pictures of Junior! He's _huge_ now; bigger than Caboose!"

"Fine," Tex conceded. "But only because I don't have anything better to do."

"Trust me, there's _nothing_ better than pictures of my kid. He inherited my good looks _and_ charm."

He got out the pictures and started showing them to her—it was surreal, seeing the kid playing basketball and participating in the school play, as if he wasn't a six foot tall alien. Tex listened as Tucker told her all sorts of ridiculous stories about Junior's adventures in boarding school, before Tex's motion trackers went off.

Tex froze. "Quiet," she hissed, activating her invisibility unit and moving away from Tucker.

Felix knocked on the door. "Tucker! There you are. Kimball was looking for you." He spotted the pictures in Tucker's hands and paused, nonplussed. "Are those physical photos?"

"Fuck yeah they are! You won't believe how many times Caboose has managed to nearly corrupt the data. Better safe than sorry!" Tucker shoved them back underneath his pillow, grinning. "Junior's on the basketball team this year, you know?"

Felix clearly was losing interest—Tex wasn't sure if Felix knew Junior was an _alien_ , otherwise he might have been more interested. Or maybe he'd heard the 'my son is the best, come look at the pictures' speech before. "Right. I'm heading out on patrol. Just wanted to let you know Kimball wanted to see you." He quickly ducked out.

Tex breathed easier one her motion trackers sensed him leaving.

"You seriously don't want him to know that I even know you?"

"As far as he's concerned, I think you're all idiots who are probably going to get us all killed."

Tucker paused, considering. "Well, I mean. You're not _wrong_."

Tex rolled her eyes. "Caboose hasn't killed any of his squad yet. I think you guys are doing an adequate job at proving me wrong."

"That's mostly because we've been ignoring the squads except for the lieutenants! And Andersmith is actually good at this soldier shit! Even if he does seem to think that Caboose is some sort of inspirational figure."

Tex paused. She'd met Andersmith before. He'd seemed like a good soldier, with a decent head on his shoulders. "Caboose?"

"Yep."

"Our Caboose."

"The same one."

"The one who thought grenades shot arrows at the enemies if you held them over your head."

"Yep."

"I think this entire army needs a psych eval," Tex muttered.

"Probably! They put us in charge, remember?"

"How can I forget? You only bring it up every few minutes."

"Hey! Can I help it if Kimball seems to think we're competent?"

"I'm not so sure if she's still buying that anymore."

"True." Tucker seemed to slump slightly.

Tex sighed, leaning back. "You should probably go find Kimball."

"What are you going to do?"

"I'll go find Simmons' squad and terrify them into running a few drills. He doesn't make them do enough."

"Dude, he can barely even _speak_ to them. The fact they're running any drills is a goddamn miracle!"

"I know. Doesn't mean they can't do more."

"Don't kill anyone."

"You can't tell me what to do," Tex said, getting to her feet.

* * *

"And _where the hell_ do you think you're going?" Tex snapped, grabbing Tucker and spinning him around to face her.

"We're going to get Wash and the others!"

"What happened to _bringing back up_?"

"We'll only get them killed! We're fucking terrible leaders!" Tucker shoved her back and tried to walk away.

"What, and this plan only gets _you_ killed?" Tex seethed. She couldn't remember the last time she'd wanted to punch Tucker this badly.

"Since when do you care?" Tucker demanded, spinning to face her. "Since when do you give a fuck if we get ourselves killed? Used to be you'd think it was _hilarious_!"

"You're all I have left, dumbass!" Tex yelled, shoving him into the wall. She hated saying it, hated admitting any such thing, but it was the truth. Church was dead. North and York were dead. She had no idea where Carolina was, or if Carolina would even be willing to look at her if she could find her. All that was left were these ridiculous Sim Troopers. And she'd do anything to make sure they stayed the exact same number of Sim Troopers.

He looked at her, and didn't say anything. She was glad. She wasn't sure if she wouldn't have hit him if he had. Especially if he'd managed to find a way to throw in a bow-chicka-bow-wow.

"So… you think this is a terrible idea? The four of us just storming off and trying to do this on our own?"

"Not at all," Tex said.

"Seriously?" Tucker blinked, looking at her. "You just said—"

Tex rolled her eyes at him. "I'll be coming _with you_ , dumbass."

"Wait, you're coming?" Tucker gaped at her.

"Of course I am," she scoffed. "Like I'm letting you morons run off again, getting into trouble?"

"I thought you said you didn't want the guys to know!"

Instead of answering, Tex disappeared.

" _Right_." Tucker nodded. "Okay, please don't let us die?"

Tex laughed. "No one gets to kill you guys but me," she assured him.

The compound was… odd. Tex didn't like it. The Feds were disorganized and scatterbrained as usual, but her motion trackers were picking up several people who shouldn't be there.

Tex focused in on one particular signature, high up. A sniper. Maybe it was Locus.

Tex was probably taking too much glee out of being able to use her invisibility again. She kept one ear out for Tucker and the others, and focused on making sure that there wasn't any real threat to them.

She managed to find the form, and frowned. It wasn't Locus, whoever it was. But the armor wasn't standard Fed either.

Frowning, Tex switched her rifle for her pistol, and got closer.

Tex snuck around the watching form, moving into place. Lightly, she pressed the muzzle of her gun against the back of the helmet. "Alright, hands where I can see them—"

The soldier grabbed her hands and twisted, pointing the pistol into the air, and then kicked, shoving Tex backwards. Tex growled and prepared to charge, but the sight of the helmet stopped her.

" _Carolina_?"

There was no mistaking her. Her armor was still the bright aqua, and there was the unmistakable way she held herself.

"Texas?" Oh good, at least she didn't have to identify herself this time. The bright flicker of an AI disappeared from over her shoulder—Tex presumed that was Epsilon. She reached out slightly, but Epsilon was too busy to respond to any signal she was sending. She hoped he was running a program, and not freaking out about her being alive.

He probably was, if he was anything like the Alpha.

The last time Tex had seen Carolina, she had been about to die, and been convinced Tex was the enemy. Tex threw down the pistol. She didn't want to fight. Not now. Hopefully, Carolina would feel the same way. She hadn't seen Tex in years. Surely that would have cooled whatever animosity Carolina had.

Of course, since then, Tex had gotten York killed.

This was just about the last place Tex would expect to see Carolina. She'd been fully prepared to have to scour the entire planet to find her once she made sure the rest of the Reds were safe. To find her here, of all places, was disconcerting to say the least.

Tex and Carolina stood there for a moment. Tex wondered if Carolina was waiting for a punch as much as she was.

Carolina broke the silence first. "You're alive?" Tex didn't think she was imagining the bitter undertone in her voice. Tex didn't blame her.

"Long story," Tex said shortly. "I've been keeping an eye on Tucker and the others—no one knows I'm here but Tucker. What are you doing here? Tucker said you took Epsilon and took off not long after the crash."

"I intercepted a communication; some space pirates are going to try to kill them," Carolina said, sounding agitated. "I don't have time to explain."

The familiar rage stirred in her chest— _no one_ got to hurt those boys. Well, she amended, thinking back. No one but her. And maybe Carolina, if she was feeling generous.

"Alright. What's the plan?" She crouched down beside Carolina.

"You'll follow my lead?"

"As long as the boys get out alive in your plan," Tex said.

"Of course they do," Carolina snapped.

"Then we won't have a problem," Tex kept her voice cool and in control.

"I— _fine_." It sounded like she was talking more to Epsilon than to Tex, stopping herself from arguing. "If your invisibility unit is working still, you stick to the ground—"

* * *

Tex gritted her teeth as she listened to Felix fucking monologue. She couldn't _believe_ it. She hadn't trusted him with who she was, sure, but she hadn't thought that he wasn't trustworthy _period._ Or that he would betray Kimball. She got into position, waiting for Carolina to give her the signal.

A part of her was screaming that it was _taking too long_ , but she kept her temper in check. They needed to know what was happening, and Carolina wouldn't let the boys die.

She thought she spotted Tucker tracking her as she moved into position, and she tried to tell herself that he knew she was coming.

It didn't matter even if he didn't.

She'd still save their asses.

"Alright," Carolina said, holding out the grenade that Tucker had nearly thrown. "That's all I needed to know."

Tex struck hard and fast, decloaking and throwing herself at Felix before he or Locus had time to do anything about Carolina's presence.

"What the hell?" He yelped as she tackled him to the snowy ground. .

"You son of a bitch!" She smashed her fist against her helmet.

"What the— _you_?"

"I'm going to make you regret you ever were born," she hissed.

"What the hell is happening?" She heard Grif yell in the background, while Carolina battled Locus on the upper balustrade.

"Just grab it and shoot!"

Felix was good—Tex had always known he was. But he was caught off guard and Tex was _angry_. He managed to roll away from her and try to stumble to his feet, but she kicked him as hard as she could, causing him to fall back to the ground.

"You're making a big mistake, Allison," Felix said through gritted teeth.

"Kicking your ass isn't a mistake, it's the highlight of my fucking week."

"You think you're so—" Tex was done listening to him talk. She charged forward again, and he barely managed to roll out of the way of her swinging fists.

He managed to produce a knife, which he threw, imbedding itself into her shoulder. Tex winced, but left it in, switching to her other side.

It was then that Carolina fell to the ground with the rest of them, clearly injured. Tex stopped trying to pummel Felix into the ground, spotting the grenade in Carolina's hand and remembering the plan.

"Everyone get close!"

Tex slammed her foot against Felix's chest, sending him flying into the wall. "See you later, Cockbite," she promised, before dashing over towards the others.

"Wait!" She heard a Fed yell, and Tex had just enough time to reach out and grab her arm, pulling her closer to the center of the blast radius.

They disappeared in a bright flash of light that seemed to make all the actual humans nearly fall over, vomiting.

"What just happened and why did it hurt?"

"Where am I?"

"I think my insides were just outside!"

"Is everyone okay?" Wash yelled as he straightened up.

"You know, I never thought I would be so happy to see you idiots again," Carolina said, changing her armor back to its normal shade. Tex smirked, mentally echoing Carolina's declaration as she checked on Donut, Sarge, and Lopez. They all seemed alive and intact. Good.

"Carolina?"

"Ah! That's not all!" The tiny hologram that had to be Epsilon appeared. He was almost a parody of the Alpha, small and tinted blue, but the voice was so similar that it hurt to hear. Tex tried her best not to flinch. "Missed me assholes?"

"You _fuck_!" Tucker howled, tossing his gun aside before charging the hologram, falling flat on his face in the process.

"Huh. I was not expecting that." Epsilon sounded legitimately confused.

"Aw, no love for me? I'm hurt," Tex said, crossing her arms.

"I'm sorry, do we know you?" Grif said.

Tex cracked her knuckles.

"Holy shit it's Tex please don't kill me." Grif backed up so quickly he nearly ran right into Caboose. Who was bouncing up and down, seemingly delighted to have her back. When she listened, she could identify a very high pitched squeal that seemed to be coming from the Blue soldier.

"You're dead," Washington looked like he was about to have an apoplexy. She'd almost feel sorry for him, if it wasn't pretty funny.

"Turns out when you cross a gigantic explosion with Wyoming's time travel unit, things go wrong," Tex said with a shrug. She couldn't help but several of them edging away from Sarge at that comment. She rolled her eyes. "Ended up here, did some mercenary work for the New Republic."

"Wait, so _you're_ the mysterious mercenary who my entire squad was terrified of?" Simmons said. He paused. "Now that I've said it I feel like I shouldn't be surprised at all."

"Oh, _you're_ Allison," the doctor said—although cooing might be the better word for it. Tex wondered if there was something wrong with her. "Locus _really_ doesn't like you."

"Good, because I don't like him either. Invisibility is _my_ thing," Tex scowled.

The others looked at her. "And the genocide?" Tucker asked, sounding honestly curious.

Tex shrugged. "That too."

Simmons coughed. "You know, I wasn't going to say anything, but you've still got a knife in your shoulder."

Tex blinked. "Oh right." She grabbed it and pulled it out. "Broke the skin too. I'm going to have to figure out repairs eventually."

"Repairs?" Wash spluttered.

Tex looked at him. "I'm a _robot_ , Wash."

"One of my finest creations!" Sarge sounded emotional. "Apart from the one with the bomb in it! That was _truly_ a masterpiece."

"Yes, especially the part where it blew up and you all thought we travelled in time," Tex said, tossing the knife to Wash, who caught it with only a slight amount of panic. She rolled her eyes—like she'd try to stab him with it after saving him. He hadn't done anything to piss her off. Yet.

"Hey, you actually _did_ travel in time! You can't make fun of us for that anymore!" Tucker said. "Also, seriously, you waited _that long_ to save our butts? I almost thought you'd decided you hated us again and ran off to do your badass loner thing."

"Carolina wanted to know what was going on. So did I."

"Wait, you _knew_ that Tex was alive?"

"Duh!" Tucker shrugged.

"You _fucking asshole_!" Grif yelled. "Seriously?"

"I wanted to know what happened," Tex said idly. "He was the least likely to blow my cover."

"And you went with _Tucker_ ," Wash said.

"My options were him, Grif, Simmons, and _Caboose_. I made the best of four very bad choices."

"What? Grif and I can totally keep secrets!" Simmons squeaked, offended.

Tex looked at him blankly.

"Shut up."

"She didn't say anything," Epsilon said.

The doctor stepped closer to Epsilon. "So… there's a tiny ghost man here. Anyone care to introduce me?"

"Oh, that's Church! Yeah, he had to leave for a while, but I knew he would come back!" Tex couldn't see Caboose's face under the helmet, but she got the distinct impression that he hadn't stopped smiling since they'd gotten here.

"Bullshit! You were totally depressed!" Tucker, on the other hand, was clearly pissed about _something_. Tex tried to decide if she was going to care. She decided not to. Dealing with Tucker's bullshit was rarely worth it.

"Shh! What? No! No Tucker! You're not remembering that right! I would not do something like that! I would not spiral downward into an emotional state of evidence and try to fill the remains with a mechanical pet just because I miss Church! Stupid Tucker." Tex felt her eyebrow climb steadily as Caboose rambled.

"I've been gone far too long," Tex said.

"I want to psychoanalyze him!" The doctor said, clearly delighted.

"Trust me, the inside of Caboose's head is a strange and somewhat disturbing place. You really don't."

"Dr. Grey, this is Agent Carolina, and that's Agent Texas. We were operatives for Project Freelancer. As for Church, he's an artificial intelligence fragment from the same organization. Codename: Epsilon. And to make a long story short, he kind of used to be leader of blue team before I showed up," Washington was trying to keep the situation under control, which Tex couldn't help but be amused by.

"And Agent Texas is a robot?" Dr. Grey asked politely, looking slightly too interested for Tex's comfort. She knew mad scientists, and Dr. Grey fit the profile very well. Tex wasn't in the mood to be experimented on.

"And she's also an artificial intelligence fragment," Wash said. "It's… complicated."

"Call me a fragment again and you'll be eating your arm," Tex said as sweetly as she could manage.

"Oooh, now I want to psychoanalyze _you_!"

Tex took a step away from her, wondering if the others would mind if she knocked the doctor unconscious.

"And tried to murder us," Epsilon sniped, appearing in front of Wash.

"That was a misunderstanding!"

"I know! I'm just saying, don't gloss over the good parts."

"At least he didn't _abandon_ us," Tucker growled.

"Psychoanalyses for everyone!" Dr. Grey cheered.

Tex glanced at Carolina. "Well, they're going to be at this for a while."

"I regret saying I missed them already."

"I think the Reds are enjoying themselves," Tex said, glancing over at them, who looked like they were a container of popcorn away from watching a very fascinating television show.

"Alright enough!" Wash tried to take control of the situation. Tex felt her eyebrow go up again. Tucker had described Wash as a fairly competent leader, but she'd assumed that was in comparison to _Church_. She hadn't expected him to actually be _trying_.

Carolina and Epsilon began to explain their side of the story, with healthy amounts of interjections and exclamations from the Reds and Blues. Tex went next, filling them all in on everything that happened since the Canyon from her perspective.

"So wait, you don't remember anything that happened in Sidewinder? Or with the Meta?" Simmons asked.

"I don't remember because I _wasn't there_."

"No, you were definitely there. Simmons still has scars to prove it," Grif said.

"It wasn't me," Tex snapped. "I'm _Beta_. Whatever the hell you want to call the version of me that Epsilon made, she's not me."

Epsilon started faking a cough.

"Don't think we won't have words about that later," she growled to Epsilon, pointing. "But right now, we've got bigger problems."

"What, like how there are two armies that are ready to blow each other's brains out thanks to Locus and Felix? We gotta tell them they're being used!" Tucker seemed pretty agitated—arguing with Epsilon didn't seem to have calmed him down.

Carolina seemed hesitant. "That's... not going to be easy."

"It never is," Tex said with a sigh.

* * *

"Grif, for the last time, put the laser—"

"Hey Tucker," Tex said casually, popping her neck. "Is that offer of ten dollars to tear off Grif's arm still good?"

"You wouldn't," Grif said, turning to her, but she recognized the sound in his voice. Even after over five years of absence, he still knew to be scared of her.

"Sure!" Tucker said. "It's been ages since I've seen you kick Grif's ass!"

"Awesome." She took a step forward, grinning underneath her helmet.

Grif screamed, threw the gun at Carolina and then tried to hide behind her. "Don't let her kill me!"

"Why is he more scared of you than he is of me?" Carolina asked Tex, picking up the laser rifle. She sounded miffed.

"Have you only threatened him, or have you ever actually kicked his ass?" Tex asked.

"First thing Tex ever did when she got to Blood Gulch was try to murder all of us!" Donut said cheerfully. "Good times!"

"Only "try"?" Carolina muttered, glancing at Tex.

"I was having an off day."

"And we're all very grateful you didn't massacre them," Wash said, clearly trying to pacify both of them.

"She used me for target practice!" Caboose sounded far too cheerful.

Carolina and Wash looked at her. "What? I shot around him!"

"How did they live long enough for us to meet them?" Wash asked Carolina.

"You know, I just realized," Tucker said. "There's totally three of you guys, and only two of Felix and Locus! Now our mercenary badasses outnumber _their_ mercenary badasses!"

"We're not mercenaries," Wash and Carolina chorused, sounding offended.

Tex remained silent. "What?" She said when they looked at her. "A girl's got to eat while on the run from a major military organization."

"No, you don't. You're an AI in a robotic body," Carolina pointed out.

"Alright, so I picked it up as a hobby. I got _paid_ to kick ass. It was fun."

"You know, I think you _really_ skewed these guys expectations about Freelancers," Epsilon noted.

"Meh," Tex shrugged. "As long as I get to punch Felix's face in, I think I'm okay with that."

"Is it weird that I've kind of missed her?" Grif asked Simmons.

"Nah, I'm just glad she's not trying to kill us anymore," Simmons said.

* * *

"Well she definitely takes after her mother," Church muttered, watching Carolina destroy the compound. Tucker sat on the crates, watching idly as Carolina screamed and rage.

"Was her mother some sort of silverback gorilla on steroids?" Sarge asked, Tucker thought he heard Epsilon choke, quickly checking where Tex was.

" _What_ did you just call me?" Tex demanded.

Sarge looked like a deer in the headlights. "Oh, fuckberries," he muttered, before trying to dive behind Grif.

"Tex, remember, we need him _alive_ ," Epsilon called desperately as Tex snatched Sarge up from where he was trying to use Grif as a human shield, and threw him halfway across the compound.

"Oh, this should be good," Tucker said, eagerly leaning forward to watch the show.

"And we're off! Excellent opening move there by Texas—she's going for a few of the old favorites. If you look right there, she's going for a full-Nelson, and _ooh_ , that ought to hurt," Church was enjoying this a _bit_ too much. Tucker didn't blame him. It was always fun to watch Tex beat someone up when he wasn't the target.

"Grif! We need to do something!"

"Like what? Get killed for getting in her way? No thanks."

" _Tex we have limited medical supplies_! And right there we can see what can simply be called, 'attempting to bury Sarge in packing crates'. I would just like to remind our viewers that each of those weighs about—" Carolina threw another one through Church, interrupting his commentary. "Oh come on, you can't _both_ be doing this at the same time!"

"She's going to kill him!" Simmons yelped.

"Oh please, like Church said, she _needs_ us."

"Okay, now that's just showing off!" Church called.

"I'm surprised he hasn't started crying yet," Tucker said gleefully. Tex had gotten bored being creative, and was settling for whacking Sarge repeatedly with a large wooden stick that looked like it had once been a telephone pole.

"He probably knows it's useless. Tex is…" Church paused, trying to come up with a word.

"Frustrated?" Donut offered.

"I was gonna say completely filled with rage, but yeah, frustrated."

"Talking about me?" Carolina seemed to have finally calmed down, and moved to join them.

"Actually, no. Sarge insulted Tex accidentally. We're watching the fireworks."

"Ooh, I think she's lining up for a finishing move! Man, I wish I had popcorn," Tucker grinned at Wash, who seemed vaguely horrified but also amused.

* * *

The others were all asleep. Tex had volunteered to keep watch—it was easy to, since she didn't need sleep.

"Epsilon," she called, once she was sure Carolina and all the others were asleep.

He appeared almost instantly. "Wondered when you'd want to talk," he said. "Hey. Long time no see."

"You're not him," she said flatly. She needed to establish that right off the bat. She didn't want to have to deal with an AI identity crisis.

"I know." But he still seemed to waver slightly under her gaze.

"You're trying to be," she struggled to keep her temper under control, but she'd never been good at it, and the fragment seemed to have an effect similar to Omega, anger boiling in her body, threatening to overflow.

He was quiet. "That's what they wanted me to be," he offered, as if it's an excuse. And she slammed her fist through him, even though it was pointless, because it was _wrong_.

She had fit with the Alpha. He was frayed at the edges, with holes where the fragments had used to be, but they had fit, nonetheless. Being around him had been _right_ in so many ways, drawing her closer.

And sometimes it had gotten to be too much, and she had run away. Run away to do her own shit, to hunt down Wyoming and Omega and remind herself that her whole world didn't revolve around that sequence of ones and zeroes that was her other half in more ways than one.

And now he was dead, and this _memory_ of him was all that was left behind.

He was like her. A shadow of what was gone.

If she thought of him like that, maybe she could stomach it.

She stared up at the stars, and didn't say anything for a while.

"They said you tried to copy me," she finally offered to break the silence.

It was clear she'd managed to find a topic that Epsilon would give just about anything to not have to talk about. But he'd tell her. She had a way with AIs.

The fact that she was capable of physically threatening them helped.

"Look, I was… kind of confused. And if it makes you feel any better, she was a badass."

Tex folded her arms. "She got killed."

"So did you! We thought." The AI paused, considering. "I have video of her utterly humiliating the guys?"

"Better." Tex nodded. "Send it to me."

"Uploading Tex vs the Reds and Tucker."

Tex tilted her head as she prepared to play it back. "Where was Caboose? And you?"

"I was finding a body. Caboose was hanging with FILSS."

"Where's Donut?" She asked, watching the different version of herself begin to absolutely murder the Reds.

"You know, I'm not actually sure. Wash shot him, and we all thought he was dead, but then he turned out to be alive, and I'm a bit fuzzy on the details. But Doc hadn't gotten to him yet so I guess he was still bleeding out somewhere."

Tex frowned. "Why would Wash shoot Donut? He's _Donut_. Unless he has a grenade, it's not like he's a threat."

"You know, I think I'll let Wash tell you about that one. You might punch him, it'll be great."

"Oh good, I need an excuse to punch someone." Tex settled down to keep watching the video.

"You spent twenty minutes beating Sarge into the ground for accidentally calling you a silver backed gorilla."

"He's still walking isn't he?"

"Yes, which honestly worries me, because it either means you've gone soft, or you missed him."

"I can still kick _your_ ass without having to worry about your ability to function."

"Gotcha, gotcha, just a random bout of mercy! Definitely didn't miss Sarge. Or any of them."

"It's good to see you understand me."

"So, you want company for the watch?"

Tex paused, considering. "Fine."

"Jeeze, no need to sound so happy about it," Epsilon griped, but he settled down beside her to make sure nothing happened to the others.

* * *

"So, the two of you are accounted for… now where's Allison?" Felix mused. He had _really_ hoped she'd come.

He still couldn't believe she'd managed to get the drop on him. He couldn't believe she'd _followed him_. Kimball had been _furious_ when he had to report her dead.

He couldn't _wait_ to make that statement true.

"She left. Said she'd rather take her chances than stick around," Carolina said.

Felix frowned. "Why don't I believe you?" It wasn't like Allison to back away from a fight, especially not one she'd seemed so eager to pick.

"She's a mercenary," Washington pointed out. "It's not like we have anything to offer her, and she said she could track you down later on her own time."

Felix tilted his head, considering. "Still… spread out. See if you can find the Reds and Blues. And Allison." It did sound like her though, preferring to come for him later than take him on while he was expecting her.

"She has an invisibility unit," growled Locus quietly. "It's unlikely we'd find her if she _is_ here. And I doubt she would have avoided us this long."

" _Felix! Something's wrong at Armonia_ ," one of the men shouted over the comms. " _Seven of us haven't reported in, and I think—"_ There was a gurgle and a gunshot, and the man cut off.

"Oops," Carolina said, and Felix whipped around to face her. "Or I guess she went to Armonia."

" _Sorry I'm missing the party,_ " Allison's voice crackled. She was _laughing_. " _Oh well. I'll say hi to Kimball for you. Have fun!_ "

"Son of a—"

* * *

Sneaking into Armonia was almost worryingly easy, given that Locus had apparently set it up so that invisible people could sneak in and out with ease.

It didn't take her long to track down the first of the space pirates. The idiots had foregone camouflage for high ground, and were laughing amongst themselves about how good it would be to get off this planet.

After hearing some of the things those assholes had to say about the New Republic, Tex wished she had more time. But unfortunately, she was on a schedule.

She turned her helmet radio on, listening carefully to Kimball's orders while she tracked down the pirates.

This was familiar; hunting the perimeter, taking out threats to the main group. If it had been Carolina's voice she was listening to over the radio instead of Kimball, it could have been any mission from years ago.

As it was, she was having some severe déjà vu.

She spotted the lieutenants below her just in time for everything to fall to pieces. She cursed, realizing she wasn't nearly as close to Kimball as she'd hoped. _And_ the pirates were now aware of her presence.

She needed to move fast.

She threw herself off the catwalks, jumping right on top of the nearest Fed. _Incapacitate, not kill_ , she reminded herself, slamming her fist against the back of the next one's helmet. Talking them down wouldn't help right now.

"Allison!" Jensen yelped. "Felix said you were dead!"

"Nope," Tex said. "I need to go find Kimball."

"Wait!" Andersmith said. "The Captains—"

"They're fine," Tex snapped. "They're a bit busy right now, but they'll be here soon. Now keep your heads down, and try not to kill anybody!"

"We'll escort you to General Kimball, ma'am!" Palomo said.

"You'll slow me down. _Knew_ I should have borrowed that speed unit," Tex growled as she turned on her heel.

"We've got a car," Bitters pointed out.

Tex paused. "I'm borrowing it."

"Yes ma'am!" Andersmith saluted, and Tex grinned.

* * *

Kimball stalked towards Doyle, furious.

Everything they'd sacrificed- _everything_ she'd _sacrificed,_ and it was for nothing. For a trap. Her men were out there, dying, and the leader of the Feds wasn't even willing to watch.

She was going to kill him.

Tucker, Caboose, Grif, and Simmons were all dead, as were their friends. And Allison had died trying to save them. Felix had told her all about it; how Allison had gone with him to try to save them, and how Locus had cut her down. How the Reds and Blues were massacred.

Kimball was familiar with grief; anyone who grew up on Chorus had to be. It was an old friend by this point.

But that didn't make this any easier.

She raised her gun. Doyle raised his.

There was a loud noise, which sounded a lot like a car crashing.

The door burst open, and Allison emerged in her familiar black armor.

"Oh good, you're both still alive. I'm leaving the dramatic car entrances to the Reds from now on."

"Allison?" Kimball nearly dropped her gun. "But you're-"

"Dead? I've heard that so many times in the past few days it's not even funny anymore." Suddenly, Allison lashed out with a knife, and a figure shimmered into view, falling to the ground.

"You fucking _bitch_ ," the man howled. Allison sighed.

"You don't get to pull the invisibility trick on _me_ , asshole." She aimed her pistol, and fired quickly and cleanly.

"Who on earth is that? I thought Locus was the only one with cloaking technology!" Doyle yelped.

"Wait, he's not one of yours?"

"Of course not! That uniform-"

"He's a pirate," Allison said, crouching down to search the body. "There's a few dozen of them scattered around the city. I took out the ones I could find, but-"

"Why would pirates-" Kimball began, before the screens around them flickered to life.

And Felix's voice began to explain everything.

"You son of a bitch," Kimball whispered.

* * *

It didn't take very long for everyone to get back to the capital. The lieutenants took a pelican out and went to the site. Tex met them at the landing pad, only to be greeted by Doctor Grey shouting for a gurney and for someone to prep surgery.

Tucker had been injured in the fight with Felix. Tex hissed at the sight of the blood covering-well, just about _everything_ , and followed Grey and Wash to the medical center. Carolina and the others went to go find Kimball and Doyle so that they could fill them in.

"I'm sorry," Grey said to them as they got into surgery. Her normally cheerful voice sounded _very_ firm, and slightly stressed. "I'm afraid that non-medical personnel aren't allowed in the surgery! Please wait outside, we'll keep you informed on Captain Tucker's progress!" And then she shut the door in their faces.

Wash stood frozen for about three seconds, before trying to break down the door. "Tucker!"

Tex grabbed his arms, hauling him back. "Wash, _shut up and sit down_." She forced him down towards one of the many seats that lined the hallways of the medical wing. She was honestly surprised that there weren't more people here, but then again, she knew next to nothing about the Feds.

"Tucker—"

"Survived five years of me, five years of you, ten years of Caboose, and giving birth to a literal blood-sucking alien. I really doubt he's going to die from a stab wound while having surgery from an actually competent doctor! So _calm the fuck down_. You're not helping anything by yelling in a blind panic in the middle of the hallway."

He stared at her. "You think he's going to be okay?"

Tex rolled her eyes at him. "He's survived worse with only Doc for medical assistance."

"You should have come with us," Wash muttered, looking down at his hands. "You probably would have stopped it."

"Tucker _planned_ to face Felix on his own, remember?"

"Which was a _terrible plan_!"

"It's _Tucker_. He doesn't do good plans. None of them do."

Wash ran his fingers through his hair. "How did they live this long?" He whispered to himself.

"Luck and Freelancers mainly."

"We've tried to kill them!"

"Mainly luck."

He slumped slightly. "We only just found each other again," he said tiredly. Tex eyed the bags under his eyes, and wondered if knocking him out would count as rest.

"Oh god," Tex groaned, as everything clicked in her head. "You two are going to be worse than Grif and Simmons. I dealt with Tucker's side for ages, I am _not_ sitting here and listening to you fret over your crush. Tucker's going to be _fine_."

Wash started to splutter and protest, but Tex walked away.

If she dedicated a subroutine to tell her when the door to the operating room opened, well, that was none of Wash's business.

* * *

The next day found all the Reds, Blues, and Freelancers crammed into General Doyle's office, trying to piece together everything that had happened.

"I'd picked up more of the teleportation grenades when I was doing a supply run a while back," Tex said. "I figured I might as well keep them, in case of emergencies."

"So we figured we'd split up," We figured the Mercs would believe Tex would run off without the rest of us, so-"

"Tex? Who's Tex?" Kimball looked about a centimeter from snapping and trying to kill them all. Tex figured she might be able to at least get Doyle, and maybe Grif, depending on how fast Tex felt like moving.

Tex raised her hand slightly. "That would be me. My codename for Project Freelancer was Agent Texas."

"Well, at least it wasn't just us in the dark," Grif grumbled, mouth full of snack cakes.

" _You're_ a Freelancer?" Doyle said, sounding so shocked Tex felt like she should probably be offended.

"Agent Texas was our first Freelancer!" Caboose said cheerfully. "She dated Church!"

"Wait," Kimball's eyes were focused on Tex like a laser beam. "You _know_ them?"

Tex shrugged. "Sorry. There's a bit of a bounty on my head and I didn't trust Felix not to cash it in. Decided it was best to just keep my head down for a while."

"We're cleared of all charges," Wash said.

" _You're_ cleared of all charges. I'm technically dead _and_ not human, so I'd really prefer not to tempt fate here."

"You're not _human_?" Kimball's voice was rapidly rising in pitch.

"I'm a robot. With a smart AI implanted. It's… a bit of a story. You'll want to be drunk for it."

Kimball stared at her. "Fine. But we _will_ have this talk."

Tex nodded.

"So what happens now?" Doyle asked quietly.

"Hell if I know," Tex said, turning to leave. "But I'm sure you'll figure it out."


	3. Tartarus

Wash had first heard about Allison a few weeks into his stint with the Federal Army of Chorus.

He'd seen a patrol come back, battered and bruised, their numbers significantly fewer than they had been when they had left, and empty handed at that.

"What happened?" He demanded of the leader. He'd spoken to her only that morning; she'd just been promoted, and was hoping to have him run some drills with her squad.

"We ran straight into Allison!" The woman said, taking off her helmet. Wash saw a new, raw-looking cut nearly bisecting her face. It would leave a nasty scar. "We're lucky she was more interested in the supplies than us!" The other soldiers around her nodded. Several of them were leaning on each other for support as Doctor Grey and her team rushed down to assist.

Wash went straight to Doyle, curious. The captain had said the name like it was something he should know; almost like a curse. He needed more information.

"Who's Allison?" He asked, ignoring how his stomach turned when he said the name. It was ridiculous; it wasn't an uncommon name, after all. It didn't mean anything; not here, not now.

Doyle sighed, slumping slightly behind his desk. Wash had never known Doyle to look well-rested or happy, but at the mention of Allison's name he seemed to appear even more exhausted and miserable.

"About a year ago, the New Republic managed to get their hands on a second mercenary. I'm afraid we don't know much about her, except that she goes by the name of 'Allison'. And Locus believes even _that_ to be an alias, which brings our total intelligence about her to around zero."

"How good is she?"

" _Very_ ," Doyle said. "Fortunately for us, she doesn't seem to get along with Felix very well, so they don't work together very often. And she mostly does supply runs or bodyguard duty instead regular combat." He sighed, looking around his office. "I think I have an intelligence report with some firsthand accounts of encounters with her, if you would like—"

Doyle's desk was a mess; the man was clearly overwhelmed. Wash declined the offer, and went to find Locus instead.

It wasn't that hard to find the man—Wash just had to follow the trail of slightly terrified soldiers. Locus had several snipers' nests all over the capital, where he could keep an eye on the perimeter. Armonia was supposed to be safe, but Wash supposed he understood the need to be sure.

"Tell me about Allison," he said.

He usually avoided Locus; the man sent shivers down Wash's spine, and his cold, calculating manner made Wash feel sick in the stomach sometimes. It brought back memories that he'd rather forget.

Locus nodded in acknowledgement, clearly approving of Wash seeking intelligence on an enemy, which almost made Wash wish he'd ignored his instincts to seek out more information. Locus's approval was not something Wash enjoyed, even though they were on the same side. "She's a mercenary. A former soldier. She's overconfident of her own abilities. She has a strong distrust of aliens and their technology. But above all," Locus turned his gaze directly to Wash, and Wash remained perfectly still, unwilling to give an inch. "She is a professional."

Wash frowned, knowing that was high praise coming from Locus. "How good is she?" He missed Freelancer intelligence sometimes; he wanted to see this Allison in action, to know how much of a threat she posed. Could he use her to find Tucker and the others, or would she be another obstacle in his way to getting them back? Why did she help the New Republic? What did they have to offer her?

Wash didn't like having so many questions, not about someone who had slaughtered her way through an entire halfway decent squad.

Locus paused for a moment too long, still evaluating Wash. "Very," he admitted, and then walked away.

* * *

Vanessa Kimball stood in her new quarters, looking around, and unable to stop herself from feeling completely overwhelmed and lost.

It was so…

Clean.

The Rebel base hadn't been dirty, but it had been in caves. There had been mold, and dirt, and mushrooms.

Armonia was… _not_. It was worn and plain, and everything was made of metal and was function over fashion, but it was the nicest place Kimball had seen since before the war. By a long shot.

She heard footsteps behind her, and whipped around, her hand going to her pistol. A part of her mind still thought she was in enemy territory, even now.

"Just me," Allison said. She'd changed out of her armor already, and was wearing her customary black turtleneck and jeans. A bottle of alcohol dangled from her fingers, and she grinned at Kimball. But there was an edge to the smile, as if she wasn't sure if she was welcome here.

"Thank god," Kimball said, stepping aside to let her in. "I don't know how you get these things."

"Doctor Grey was only too happy to let me have a go at her private stores in exchange for a peak at my blueprints," Allison said casually.

And there it was. The reminder of Allison's lies.

When she had met Allison, it had seemed like a windfall. A blessing. Allison had been competent and professional. She didn't bring in massive amounts of technology or weapons like Felix did, but she had brought her squads back alive more often than not, and had a gift for finding small caches of supplies.

Over the months, she'd become Kimball's friend. She'd been mysterious and reclusive, and didn't talk about herself much. They'd shared a bunk for months, and what Kimball knew about her could be counted on one hand.

And now, she knew they might all have been a lie.

"Can you even get drunk?" Kimball demanded.

"Not really," Allison admitted. There was an angle to her shoulders that Kimball might have called ashamed in anyone else, but the jut of Allison's chin and the defiant look in her eyes refuted any such idea.

"Good. More for me then," Kimball snatched the bottle.

Allison laughed quietly, sitting down on Kimball's new bed. "You have questions?"

Kimball unscrewed the cap from the bottle and took a swig. "I've spent the last twelve hours arguing with Donald Doyle about living quarters for my people, Felix just betrayed me, and you're a robot. I need a little while."

"Noted," Allison said, leaning back to wait.

Kimball paused as she had a thought. She swallowed, pausing for a moment to appreciate the quality of Dr. Grey's moonshine. "Do you prefer Texas?" She asked, after a moment.

Allison looked up at her, blinking her electric blue eyes slowly. Kimball had always thought the color was unusual, and now she knew why. She hated herself for being so _stupid_. When had Allison ever needed the infirmary? Or joined the rest of the army in the cafeteria? Kimball had always assumed it was just antisocial behavior and the fact that Allison had been so much better than the rest of them.

So many signs, and she'd missed them all.

"Tex," Allison said, finally. "Allison… she's…" She let out a huff of breath. "She's the person I'm based off. In a way. It's complicated."

 _Complicated_. Texas said it like a curse. Kimball took a long swig out of the bottle, turning it over in her mind. She could probably push, but the look in Texas' eyes said that she might not like the answers.

"You don't go by that normally?" She chose to ask instead.

Texas drew her long blonde hair into a ponytail, her eyes far away. "There's really only one person who called me that," she said.

"Who?" Kimball put the bottle down. Her chest felt pleasantly warm.

"His name was York," she said softly. She was steadfastly not looking at Kimball. "He was… a friend, I guess you could call him."

"You guess?"

"I'm not good with friends," Tex's mouth was twisted, lost somewhere between a smirk and a grimace.

Kimball tilted her head. "What happened to him?"

"I got him killed," Texas said flatly. "I was stupid, and sloppy, and made a mistake, and he paid for it."

Kimball paused, and handed Tex the bottle. "No harm in trying, right?'

Tex laughed, loud and honest, and took a swig.

And Kimball knew that by the end of the night, she'd trust Tex to watch her back again.

She just needed another drink or two first.

* * *

Watching Washington being the hardass drill sergeant was one of the funniest things Tex had ever seen. Not that he was doing a bad job or anything—he was doing a great job at placing the fear of Wash in them—but because Tex had distinct memories of Wash on his skateboard, of him wandering the hallways looking for a sauna that never existed.

Tex wandered in partway through, when Bitters and Palomo were giving Wash a hard time. "Slacking off, Antoine?" Tex asked sweetly, causing the orange-tinted soldier to yelp in fear. Palomo, seeing her, instantly redoubled his efforts to hit the target. Tucker had once paid Tex five bucks to terrify the guy, and the result had been one mildly traumatized member of Green Squad.

She saw Wash staring at her. "I was looking for you, Wash," she added, turning to face him. She grinned, wide and feral. "Want to show these rookies what it looks like when _real_ soldiers spar?"

She could almost picture the expression on Wash's face, and she grinned behind her helmet.

He leaned in. "Are you _trying_ to undermine me?" He snapped, too quietly for the lieutenants to hear.

"These kids have seen me beat every person who's gone into the ring with me in three seconds flat, Wash," she said, just as softly. "They're going to be terrified of you if you walk out without a single broken bone."

Wash groaned quietly. He certainly couldn't back down, they both knew that. "Certainly, Agent Texas," he said, straightening his posture. His voice was clipped and professional. It didn't betray anything.

Tex's grin widened. It had been _so long_ since she'd had anyone to spar with. The last time had been when she and York had been staking out O'Malley's hideout. They'd managed to get a round in. And before that? Not since Freelancer.

Tex was going to enjoy having actual decent opponents around as much as she could.

Maybe she could have sparred with Felix, back with the Rebels, but something had always held her back. She hadn't trusted him enough not to recognize that she fought like a Freelancer, or not to stab her, for that matter. She hadn't wanted him realizing that she was a robot any more than she'd wanted him IDing her as a Freelancer survivor.

She and Wash moved into their opposite corners of the sparring ring. A crowd was already gathering; all the Rebels knew they were in for a treat, and several Feds who knew Wash had a similar inkling. The Reds and Blues had arrived with incredible speed—Grif was still panting slightly.

She spotted a gleam of sea-foam in the back, and knew they'd even attracted Carolina's attention.

"No weapons, no enhancements," Wash said to her, and Tex nodded, almost offended that Wash thought she'd _need_ to cheat. They both stripped out of their armor, following typical hand-to-hand combat protocol. Tex had never followed it back on the ship—orders—but here, she didn't give a shit. She heard some people whisper at the sight of her face, but no one was putting the pieces together and coming to _AI_. Which was good. No need to spread that around anymore than it already was.

She'd seen Wash fight, back on the Mother of Invention. He'd been good—his position on the Leaderboard hadn't been a fluke, after all—but there was good, and there was _this_.

He moved with a confidence that Tex hadn't seen before. He was stronger, he was faster. Years of pushing himself, of surviving, had turned the team rookie into a competent soldier.

They circled each other, lashing out occasionally, both of them watching for weaknesses, for mistakes.

Tex lunged first, trying to catch Wash in a hold, which he barely side-stepped, slamming his foot into her back, sending her crashing down hard.

She bounced back up, grinning widely. Oh, this was too much fun. She charged again, feinting right before slamming her fist against Wash's right shoulder. Wash stumbled, but retaliated, aiming a series of quick punches at her face.

The crowd was murmuring excitedly, and she _definitely_ was hearing bets. Tex grinned at Wash, uncontrolled and excited, and saw him return it for a moment.

He was having as much fun with this as she was.

Wash had always fought like a marine back at the MOI. Now, Tex could see he had expanded. There were traces of Carolina, hints of other teachers—probably from his days as Recovery One—and some moves that no one but Tex would recognize as the same fighting style that all the Reds and Blues had developed over the years. Sure, they were polished and perfected, and utilized with what could definitely be deadly force, but it was unmistakable.

He tried to elbow in the face as she grabbed him from behind in a chokehold. Tex instantly released him and grabbed his arm, sending him flying across the ring. He landed hard, and Tex paused, concerned, before her sensors told him he was alright.

"Call," Wash coughed.

Tex laughed, and went to help him up. "You've gotten better."

"Had to," Wash said quietly. "It was that or die."

"The best incentive there is," Tex refused to let herself sound sympathetic. He was alive, after all. He'd pulled through.

Wash, to her surprise, snorted. "I suppose that's true enough."

"You want to clear the crowd, or should I?"

"Think you can get rid of the Reds too?" Wash asked her out of the corner of his mouth, scanning the audience they'd gathered. Kimball and Doyle had arrived at some point.

"Not a chance," Tex snorted.

"I'll do it then." Wash turned to the crowd. "Don't you people have something better to do? Do I need to readjust the training roster?"

The gym emptied amazingly fast. Wash was doing a good job terrifying these armies. Tex laughed, going to put her armor back on.

"Whoa, Tex?" Tucker was leaning against the ropes, looking at her. "Is your arm supposed to be doing that?"

Tex looked down, and cursed as she realized her sleeve had ripped in the fight. Wash must have hit it too hard at some point, and now it was sending off sparks.

"Damn," she said, tugging her sleeve down to cover it.

"Agent Washington!" Doyle had managed to gather the courage to approach the ring. "Are you quite alright?"

"I'm fine, General," Wash said, already strapping on his armor. He disliked being exposed as much as Tex did, it seemed. "I've had worse hugs from Caboose."

Tex felt like she should be offended, but she'd seen the damage Caboose could do when sufficiently motivated to hug someone, so she opted to shrug and keep putting on her greaves.

"I was just concerned," Doyle said, sounding stiff. "I am well aware of Agent Texas' capacity for brutality."

Tex rolled her eyes. Doyle had more of a spine than she thought, if he was willing to talk about her in her presence.

"Agent Texas was hardly _brutal_ , General." Well shit, Kimball had decided to approach.

"On the contrary!" Doyle said. "She positively _decimated_ my troops every time she encountered them!"

Tex put her helmet on, and tried to ignore Doyle. It had been so much easier when he'd been the leader of the enemy. But he was a _very_ annoying ally. One holding a grudge. Not that Tex blamed him—Tex had certainly done her fair share of damage to the Federal Army of Chorus, and she was the only mercenary who _hadn't_ betrayed them, so she was pretty sure she was getting some second-hand resentment.

But it didn't mean she had to like it.

"I wouldn't say _decimate_ , exactly," Tex said, rolling her eyes.

"You have killed entire patrols!" Doyle must be _really sure_ that she wasn't going to kill him. Tex put another point in the "not entirely a coward" column.

Tex shrugged. "It was _war_ ," she reminded him. "I was on the other side. How many of squads died on your orders, General?" She leaned in close, and he recoiled. "Don't forget, I'm _on your side_."

"You are a _mercenary_!" Doyle snapped, his spine straightening. He said the word like a curse, which, she supposed, was fair enough, given what Felix and Locus had done.

Tex crossed her arms. "What, it's only okay when you're the one hiring them?" She sighed. "You don't have to like me, General. That's fine with me. But you better learn to tell your friends from your enemies," she said.

Her eyes drifted to Carolina, who was still hanging back, watching. She hadn't moved at all since Tex had last spotted her.

Tex vaulted the ropes, and left. She felt Carolina's gaze follow her.

Her arm needed repairs. Tex prodded it thoughtfully. She had a kit in her bunk, she could probably do it herself. No need to go admit she needed help to Sarge or Doctor Grey.

* * *

Carolina couldn't find Kimball.

Which was irritating, because she needed to talk to her about these schematics she and Epsilon had been pouring over. And worrying, because that might mean she was fighting with Doyle again, and the tension between the generals was starting to affect morale.

Finding Kimball's quarters didn't take too long, not with Epsilon guiding her through the halls.

She knocked, and then entered without waiting for a response.

The last thing she expected to see was Agent Texas sitting cross legged on the bottom bunk, her back turned to the door, her arm braced up against the top mattress, using a screwdriver to open a panel on her arm.

Carolina stared.

She'd known that Texas was a robot for years now; she'd seen sparks fly from her body where blood should be, heard the words coming out of Tex's own mouth.

Beta, housed in a body built by Sarge, of all people.

It was another thing, however, to see it.

She'd imagined it would be like Lopez; a suit of armor filled with wires and steel bones, strong and sturdy and able to withstand a lifetime of damage.

What she saw instead… was surprising, to say the least.

From the back, she couldn't see Tex's face. But in the low black tank top she wore, Carolina could see the expanse of artificial skin.

The skin was ripped in many places, peeled away to show gleaming chrome. It was cracked like glass in others—impact sites of bullets. There were gashes in some places, dug deep enough that it went past the steel layer to the wires that lived beneath. Her shoulders were the worst—there was a hole in her left one that Carolina could see right through, as if a bullet had passed through completely.

Texas had repaired her armor, but not her own skin.

Tex turned to face her, and Carolina saw how Kimball had never realized what her bunkmate was, despite months, if not an entire year, of sleeping in the same room.

Her face was in surprisingly good repair. If it weren't for the bright, electric blue of her eyes, Carolina might never have realized that something was off about Texas with only her face as reference. Her irises glittered and flickered, like a digital screen instead of real eyes. Something that could easily be explained away as implants or even cybernetics. A quick glance at Tex's hands revealed they were in similarly good shape. A long sleeved shirt with a high enough neck, like Texas had worn during her sparring match with Wash, and Tex could pass for normal with amazing ease.

"What happened there?" Carolina asked, glancing down at the exposed wires where Tex had been fiddling.

"Wash accidentally banged up some of shit when we were sparring," Tex frowned. "Busted up one of my mobility wires. Gotta splice it back together, otherwise it'll be harder to punch with my left hand."

"And we couldn't have that," Carolina said, unable to help the small smile that was tugging at her lips.

"Hell no. When I see Felix next, I'm going to need both hands to rip his fucking head off," Tex picked up the screwdriver again and went back to work.

Carolina couldn't help but notice that, upon a closer look, that Tex's face was covered in the slight puckers and lines of repairs of synthetic skin being used like patches on clothes to cover up damage. In a human, Carolina would have called them scars. But on Tex, Carolina knew to call them repairs. Self-repairs, at that. Another person could have done a better job. But still, it could pass for human. Her eyes drifted back towards the gaping hole in Tex's shoulder.

Tex glanced up idly, noticed where Carolina was looking, and shrugged. "Priority repairs only." Tex said grimly. "Don't have the parts."

"Haven't you asked Sarge?" Carolina asked, folding her arms. She wondered how long Texas had been postponing maintenance. Some of the exposed metal was shiny and new, other areas dulled and dirty. It looked like years of markings and scars.

Tex's face was nothing like her mother's. A small blessing. Of course she wouldn't, Carolina reminded herself. This body was Sarge's creation, not her father's.

The only similarity was the blonde ponytail, and Carolina could ignore that. Whatever she felt about Texas, she was still a soldier that Carolina was, at least marginally, responsible for. She'd followed Carolina's lead in the field. Tex had always been one to follow orders instead of give them, back at Freelancer. And now, at least, she seemed willing to follow Carolina's lead.

"We need you in top shape," Carolina said firmly.

Tex growled. "I can repair _myself_." There was the familiar tone that Carolina knew so well. She remembered the highway, remembered the desperation, remembered _losing_ , and she clenched her fists so tightly her fingernails started forming grooves in her palms.

"You _haven't,_ " Carolina snapped, losing her patience with Tex.

"I don't know if you've noticed, but we're fighting a war here! I can function just fine," Tex got to her feet, and took a step towards Carolina.

"I'm not about to have you get sloppy!" Carolina spat.

All the old hate, the hurt, the bitterness was welling out, and she didn't even care. Texas had been _dead_. Carolina had said goodbye to her ghost, had managed to make her peace with the fact that her father had ruined everything Carolina had ever cared about in order to chase this shadow of her mother. She'd thought she'd let go of York running away with Tex, with only a note saying he was sorry, of seeing the lighter by the scorch marks and knowing he'd died for Tex's mission.

 _"Damn it, jam! Cover, cover!_ "

But now she was alive, when everyone else was still dead, and Carolina wanted to scream at the unfairness of it all. That Texas had managed to beat _death_ , and all that was left in her wake were the bodies of people Carolina cared about.

Carolina took another step forward, and it felt like she was back on the Mother of Invention, in the training room, the AI buzzing in her head and Tex's form stalking towards her, but it wasn't Eta and Iota in her head this time, it was—

"Stop it!" Epsilon yelled, appearing between them. "Fucking _stop it_!" Anxiety and frustration radiated off him in waves.

Carolina drew herself short, even though every inch of her was screaming to keep moving, to continue the fight that had ended in snowbanks and Maine.

"Get repairs, Agent Texas," Carolina said coldly. It took every inch of self-restraint she had to keep her voice even and low. "We don't want you _jamming_ on a mission."

She spun on her heel and marched away, and she realized that her cheeks were wet.

She heard a slight _thud_ as Tex sat on the bed.

"Carolina, that was too far! That was fucking out of line!" Epsilon was seething; she could feel his fury pouring through her mind, protective over Tex, even now.

Even now, after everything, he was _taking her side._ Everyone always did, and she was alone, and if she closed her eyes, there was snow, and a cliff, and—

"Log off!" She snapped, slamming the door of her own bunk behind her.

She collapsed on the floor, Epsilon's absence turning her mind into an echo chamber.

* * *

It was three against two, and neither Felix, Locus, or Control liked those odds. Especially not when one was an enigma like Allison. Carolina and Washington were manageable problems, especially now with Price readily providing information.

But Allison was a virtually empty file, with skills that impressed Locus and worried Control enough to give Felix the OK to try to take care of her, even though they were supposed to be laying low until Kimball made her move.

Of course, the problem with laying a trap was that it had to be carefully constructed enough to only catch the prey you were after. Not that Felix would _complain_ if he caught Carolina or Wash instead of Allison, but he _really_ hoped Allison wouldn't bring them.

Luckily, Felix had worked alongside Allison for a year, and he knew Kimball _very_ well. He knew how to handle this.

Patrols were rare; Kimball and Doyle were keeping their people close. But they still had to forage for supplies, and it didn't take long for Felix to locate one that fit his needs.

Small, fairly decent fighters, all New Republic, and no Reds or Blues. Felix grinned as he took aim. He wasn't Locus; sniping wasn't his strong suit, but he could make do.

He listened to their desperate SOS, and grinned when he heard one of the squad members reassure the other that Allison was coming to save them. He threw a grenade, forcing them to scatter. He only needed enough of them alive to draw Allison in, after all.

Soon his motion trackers caught sight of a mongoose rapidly approaching, and Felix grinned.

It took him less than a minute to slaughter his way through the rest of the squad. Felix stood in the middle of their bodies, and waited, nearly bouncing with anticipation.

He'd been wanting this fight ever since he'd met her. She'd made things _so difficult_. This was going to be fun, Felix decided, picking his favorite knife and holding it in his hand.

She rolled into the clearing, and Felix threw a grenade, sending her flying. She landed in a perfect crouch, her helmet whipping right towards him.

"There you are!" He said. The radio jammer was active, preventing her from sending out any signals for help. She wasn't going to get back-up from a bunch of kids with a machine gun this time. "I was wondering when you were going to show up?"

"Sorry to keep you waiting," she drawled, but he knew she was furious as she took in the bodies of the rebels all around him.

"You know Allison, I've been waiting for this day for a _long_ time," Felix said, tossing his knife up and down in his hand. "It's going to be so much _fun_ to kill you!"

Allison _laughed_. That was new. And worrying. Felix wasn't particularly used to people finding his threats funny if they knew him at all. And Allison had seen what he was capable of, so she certainly knew him. His eyes narrowed.

"You still haven't figured it out, have you?" Somehow, Felix got the impression that the expression under her helmet closely resembled that of a shark. It was unnerving.

"The name's Texas, cockbite." She cracked her knuckles, obviously smirking behind her helmet. "And I've been wanting to kick your ass since day one."

Felix froze for a second, gaping. " _Another_ Freelancer?" He hissed. He didn't recognize the name immediately, although he felt something in his mind saying he should. "Aren't you all supposed to be _dead_?"

She laughed again, shifting onto the balls of her feet, ready for a fight. "Guess we're just like cockroaches. Can't get rid of us."

Felix had heard enough. He threw his knife, which she dodged with ease, charging forward, moving into hand to hand.

Normally, Felix considered himself excellent at close combat. He could beat Locus; he'd met very few people who could best him. His knives and his own combat prowess made him nothing short of one of the best fighters. It was why he was paid the top rate, after all.

But fighting Allison was like fighting an entire squad at once. She moved fast, and threw her Felix around like she was a wrestler instead of a martial artist. She eschewed her guns in favor of her fists and her body, and Felix realized with a terrifying moment of clarity that this was why she'd never wanted to spar with him in hand to hand.

Because there was no way he could have missed this; the raw power behind every kick, the fluidity of her movements, as if she'd done this a thousand times before, as if she'd seen every variation of a counterattack, and knew exactly how to beat it. It was confident and powerful and Felix gritted his teeth and tried to get a hit in.

She was still human. She could bleed, and Felix would take great enjoyment seeing what her face looked like before he killed her _slowly_. He couldn't wait to paint the snow red with her blood. His fingers itched at the thought of it, and he pressed on. He got in a few hits, but they all seemed to be glancing, not even slowing her down for a second. Each hit of hers, however, carried bruising force, and he imagined her smirk widening as each one made contact.

He raised his shield to get between one of her blows, stumbling backwards from the force anyways. She vanished from sight, and Felix threw another knife, aiming for the faint shimmer that he knew to look for after all his years of working with Locus.

The knife stuck, but her invisibility didn't falter and neither did she. She darted around the edge of his shield, slamming her fist against the side of his helmet with enough force that Felix bit the inside of his mouth. He tasted blood, and stumbled. A loud ringing filled his ears, and he realized that she'd broken the portable jammer that he'd brought with him to stop her from sending for help.

She straightened up, hand flying to her helmet. He knew that look. She'd just gotten a radio message. She was needed elsewhere, but she wasn't about to leave him alive.

Felix threw a grenade into the ground and ran as the snow threw up enough cover to distract her.

He cursed as he sprinted into the woods, checking his motion trackers to make sure that Allison— _Texas_ —wasn't following him. He tasted the name as he slumped against a nearby tree, clutching his ribs. His helmet told him that she'd broken three of them.

A Freelancer. Texas. Now wasn't that just _dandy_?

He tried to think of what he knew about Texas, now that he didn't have to concentrate on the fight on hand. He didn't remember seeing much about Texas in the files he'd looked over for Freelancer, but she'd been mentioned in footnotes of the Reds and Blues.

He was also pretty sure she was supposed to be dead.

Not that it mattered. She soon would be.

Felix activated his healing unit, and hissed as the biofoam spread over his ribs. He added every bruise, every crack into his mental accounts with this Texas.

For every one of them, he'd drag her suffering out longer.

He'd have to ask Price for tips.

* * *

Kimball sent both Tex and Carolina out to secure the base, and neither of them said a word. They hadn't spoken all week, and neither of them were willing to try to speak to the other first.

Tex pushed any thoughts aside and went into the field.

Working in the field with Carolina was pretty fucking great if Tex had to say so.

Tex wondered, as they stood, watching Tucker and Sarge celebrated their victory, why the Director had thought it had been a good idea to set them all up against each other. Why he'd been so eager to see them destroy themselves from the inside out.

Tex knew she hadn't helped anything, back at Freelancer. She'd stirred Carolina up, sometimes on purpose, needling the other Freelancer. Her reactions had been funny, and Tex enjoyed stirring up shit. But she'd never hated her, or even disliked her.

Not the way Carolina hated her still.

And even though Tex wanted to, she couldn't really blame her for that.

"Alright, that's enough," Carolina called, although her amusement was obvious. Tex couldn't help but wonder at how much she had changed since the Project. "We just took their base. No need for cruel and unusual punishments.

Tex snorted quietly. "If we wanted cruel and unusual, we should have brought Donut. Have you ever heard him trying to do showtunes?"

Carolina groaned. "If I never have to see another kickline—" She broke off as Sarge and Tucker approached.

Tex decided that it had just been decided that they were going to ignore the fight. Which was completely fine with her. She wasn't in the mood for feelings. Punching things felt more appropriate today. Most days, actually.

She sighed and went to check the perimeter. She wasn't in the mood for more surprises.

* * *

Felix grabbed Price by the shirt and threw him against the wall, not caring that some of the other former prisoners were staring. "Tell me about Texas," he snarled. His body felt like one big bruise and his defeat rankled. Even though the healing unit had already fixed his ribs, they still hurt like hell. Felix wasn't in the mood for playing Price's weird games. He wanted answers, and he wanted them _now_.

Price blinked slowly, as if being thrown into a wall was a normal and unexciting situation. Felix gritted his teeth. "Agent Texas?" He straightened up. "She died several years ago when her ship crashed."

"Well, I just met a former colleague of mine who declared that her name was Agent Texas of Project Freelancer, so _humor me_ ," Felix said, hand drifting towards his pistol.

Price frowned. "This former colleague. What was her name?"

"She called herself Allison," Felix said, and nearly stared as Price's eyes widened slightly in shock.

"I see," Price said, almost too quietly to be heard. Then the moment passed, and he was back to his cool, collected self. "Agent Texas was Freelancer's top agent—"

"Don't lie to me," Felix snapped. "I've seen the records. Agent Carolina was the top-ranking Freelancer."

"Agent Texas' activities were strictly kept off the record. She functioned in a… confidential capacity. Her specialty was destroying evidence of Freelancer intervention in an area, as well as ensuring that the mission objective was completed at all costs. She was equipped with the Omega AI and an active camouflage armor enhancement, which allowed her to remain undetected, even by her own teammates. She led the incursion against Freelancer, intending to recover the Alpha AI, an objective which she failed. Afterwards, we have record of her in Blood Gulch, working closely with the Reds and Blues."

"Now, this is all very interesting, but I'm looking more for how to _beat her_ ," Felix snapped. "She keeps pulling out new tricks, and I'm losing my patience."

Price raised his eyebrow at Felix, but complied. "Agent Texas struggles with her temper. Once she selects a goal, she will follow it until the end. She views failure as catastrophic and personal, by all accounts. She refuses to back down from a fight." He paused, thoughtfully. "In all likeliness, she will be very close with Agent Carolina. Protective, even. Her judgement may be impaired if something was to happen to her."

Felix found himself grinning. "Now _that's_ what I wanted to hear."

* * *

"You and Carolina okay?" Tucker asked her, tilting his head.

Tex glowered at him. "Epsilon needs to learn to keep his mouth shut," she snapped.

"Eh, he likes the sound of his own voice," Tucker said with a shrug. "Besides, I think he's worried."

"He also needs to mind his own business. As should _you_."

"Fine, fine, don't rip my head off," Tucker muttered.

"Why aren't you bothering Doctor Grey?" Tex asked.

"Uh, because she's doing boring shit? And she also told me to go bother you. And I haven't really gotten to talk to you much for a while, so I figured, why not?"

Tex sighed. "There's a war on," she reminded him.

"Yeah, I've noticed! And there was one on when we were with the Rebels, but you still stopped by to talk!" He nudged her in that conspiratorial way that reminded her of their days back in Blood Gulch, where he'd bother her about whatever he was curious about this week until the dirty jokes drove her to punching him. "So what changed, huh? Needed some space from me and all of our glorious sexual tensio— _ouch_!"

"No, dumbass," Tex said, crossing her arms, although she was smirking as Tucker dramatically rubbed his arm where she'd punched it. "I've just been busy, that's all."

He squinted at her. "You know, I'd offer to help if something's wrong, but you'd probably take that as an invitation to kick my ass therapeutically or something, so I'm just going to go see if Doctor Grey's figured out anything cool."

"Good idea," Tex said.

She went to go find Sarge and Caboose.

Of course, that was when everything went sideways.

* * *

Tucker went down first, a bullet in his shoulder, and he didn't even have time to scream before a second one went through his throat. Tex felt the rage overwhelm her, and she raced forward. She wasn't even conscious of what she was doing.

Before her head could clear, Donut went down, a grenade attached to his helmet, and Tex yelled, reaching out to rip it away, but she wasn't fast enough. She should have taken a speed enhancement, like Carolina suggested, but it was too late, and they were _dying_.

She was losing them again.

"Did you really think you could save them?" Felix laughed, holding a knife. Carolina and Wash were supposed to be holding him off. Fear flooded Tex's veins. "C'mon, Allison. You should know better than that. These losers can't do anything right. And what's that thing about you?" He seemed to relish this, moving towards her at a pace that was positively languid. "Oh right. You _always_ fail."

"You're full of shit," she snapped. "That's not true."

"Oh, but it is." He stretched out his hands. "Sorry, when was the last time you actually _achieved_ anything? When you had something that lasted? Oh right. It was _them_." He tilted his head. "How long do you think the ones still alive will last? A minute? Two?"

Tex charged him, but Locus intercepted her, slamming the butt of his sniper rifle against her helmet, sending her backwards.

She fell backwards, and she couldn't get to her feet before Locus shot Sarge through the helmet.

Fury spiked in Tex again, and she scrambled to her feet, going for the kill. Felix laughed again, and threw his knife over Tex's shoulder. It buried itself in Caboose's heart. Tex screamed and jumped on him, ripping his helmet off.

It wasn't Felix under the helmet.

"You're just a shadow," CT said to her, face bloodied and bruised, and Tex reared back. CT reached up and grabbed Tex's neck, trying to strangle her. Tex shoved down, pushing her away.

A tomahawk appeared in her hands, and buried itself in CT's chest.

"Another one, Tex?" York was crouching by her side. "Jeeze, we're dropping like flies around here." He offered her a hand.

"You're dead," Tex said numbly.

And then it clicked in her head.

"Oh," she said. "I guess this is what a dream is like?"

"Do android dream of electric sheep?" York quipped at her. Tex glared at him.

And she took a deep breath.

York dissolved in front of her in a wave of ones and zeroes. The bodies of the Reds and Blues did too, and Tex felt herself breathe easier, even though she couldn't remember if they had been dead before or not. Something was standing between her memories, stopping her from being able to remember.

The only one that didn't was CT, who stood up. She was still wearing Felix's armor, which was twisted and wrong in so many ways that Tex didn't have words for.

"AI don't have nightmares," Tex said, turning back to face CT.

"Not normally, no," CT said, tilting her head.

Tex closed her eyes, battering at the mental wall, trying to remember what she'd done that broke down such a fundamental rule of being a robot. She didn't sleep. She certainly didn't dream. She had regrets, sure, but nightmares like this didn't happen.

She stared at CT. "You're not her. You're like me."

The figure flickered, and became something large and red and distinctly alien. "Correct," the AI thundered. "I was curious at your presence, that an AI was willing to attempt to prove herself a true warrior."

Tex laughed. "Curious? The hell was that?"

"The test of a true warrior. Which you have failed."

Tex shook her head. "That's a bullshit measurement. Let me out of here."

"Very well," the AI said magnanimously. "I wish you luck in your future endeavors."

Tex thought about the sight that he had just shown her. "I won't need it," she said confidently, but she wasn't as sure.

* * *

Tex fell backwards out of the portal, seething. "I'm going to check the perimeter," she said, stomping off.

"Tex!" Tucker yelled, but no one followed her. Good. She needed space after seeing that. She couldn't look at Tucker right now, not when she was going to expect to see blood stains covering his armor.

Suddenly, she realized that she was being tailed. Pausing for a second, she identified space pirates using camouflage. Fuckers. They'd been tricked.

She heard the others shouting and shots fired, and Tex _moved_.

They'd only sent four guys after her. Idiots. She killed them as quietly as she could and then crept back to where she'd left the others.

Carolina had used the bubble shield to protect the others, but she was clearly nervous, and Epsilon couldn't run the thing forever.

Well, might as well give her a bit of a distraction to work with. Tex opened fire, scattering the pirates. The others quickly took advantage of their distraction.

Tex checked them, making sure they were all okay. "Why'd they make their move?"

"Caboose is a true warrior, there's another sword on this planet, and apparently the aliens decided that a fucking magic button that can kill an entire planet is a good idea!"

"Fuck, I miss all the good stuff," Tex said.

"And Sharkface got away!" Caboose reported.

"Sharkface?" Tex asked.

"Yeah, seriously Caboose? What kind of a name is that?"

"I'm assuming Caboose is referring to a man with red armor, who seems to have a grudge against Agent Carolina!" Doctor Grey said cheerfully. "Now we really need to get going, otherwise Felix and Locus will wipe out all life on this planet! And that wouldn't be good!"

Tex glanced at Carolina, who didn't look at her. "Let's go," Carolina said instead. "We need to beat them there."

* * *

" _Carolina_!" The words tore out of her mouth before she could stop them. _Not again. Not this time._ She charged forward, her pistol out. The man turned towards her and prepared for a fight that she wasn't willing to give him. Not this time.

Tex shot him three times in the shoulder, then vaulted over him, running for the edge of the cliff. Her systems were screaming at her to stop, to strategize, to _think_. Her body wasn't in the best shape as it was. She'd been putting off repairs too long. But that didn't matter.

Carolina was at the bottom, and this time, Tex was not going to let anything stop her.

Last time she'd ran, certain that Carolina had died, that it would only be a body that she'd find at the bottom of that cliff. And with her failure with Church and with the Meta between her and Carolina, she'd cut her losses and run.

She was not going to let that happen this time. She still didn't know what had happened to Carolina. Maybe she never would. But she was _not_ about to let her slip through her grasp this time.

She jumped.

Tex had always been a fan of the way the wind felt around her as she fell—she'd leapt off buildings before, and jumped out of ships, and generally found it to be fun.

Usually, of course, she'd had a jet pack or at least a parachute.

She hit the ground hard, the snow doing virtually nothing to cushion her fall. Her armor absorbed most of the impact, but she felt it deep inside of her. No major damage that she could tell. She'd be fine.

She spotted the teal armor ahead of her and raced forward. _Don't be dead_.

"Epsilon!" Tex called out, kneeling beside Carolina's prone form. " _Epsilon_!"

There was a flicker, and then he appeared. "I'm here, I'm here!"

"What happened?" Tex demanded, ignoring the rush of relief.

"She tried to run too many systems at once, I couldn't handle it!" Epsilon flickered out for a second before reappeared.

"Is she alright?"

"I'm running her healing unit, she'll be fine," Epsilon said, although there was no disguising his own concern.

"Injuries?"

"She's beat up pretty bad, Tex," Epsilon said.

Tex knew that was a warning, but she ignored it. She reached for the seals on Carolina's helmet, and popped them open.

Carolina's face was virtually as she remembered it being. Her hair was longer now, but it was still the same vivid shade of red she remembered. There were new scars and new lines around her eyes, lines that Tex knew Carolina was too young to have, but they were there anyways.

Tex stared at Carolina for a moment longer than she had any right to.

She didn't have Allison's memories. She wasn't like Alpha, with a lifetime crammed into her head, with thoughts or feelings that belonged to someone else. Her life had begun when Alpha had thought her into existence. She wasn't Allison in any way shape or form. She didn't remember Carolina, she never had.

Once, after they had put her in her new body, they had shown her photos. Most were random, some were from people from Allison's life. Carolina's face had been among them. Tex hadn't known her, hadn't felt a single thing when she'd seen that face, mixed in among dozens of others. She'd felt surprise, later, when she'd seen Carolina's face for the first time and recognized her from the photos, but that had been the only recognition Tex had felt.

Theoretically, there should be no reason for Tex to be drawn to Carolina. She was not her daughter in any way, shape, or form.

But losing Carolina had been agonizing. Fighting her on the ship had been terrifying, as all of Tex's instincts screamed against hurting her. Tex had never before been in a fight she wasn't eager to have, but that day, she had to stop herself from pulling her punches, because Alpha had needed her, and she wasn't about to fail him.

Of course, she had anyway.

She'd offered to let Carolina come with her, and even though she'd promised York she would if she could, she'd meant it.

And then Maine had ripped her AI right out of her head, and all Tex could do was watch.

Tex had once told Church that she'd give anything to have saved Carolina.

She'd meant every word.

"Flag down the others," Tex said to Epsilon, putting Carolina's helmet back on, blocking the red hair from view again. "I'll carry her to the transport."

"Alright, on it!" Epsilon disappeared. Tex frowned, concerned for him now that her fears about Carolina were assuaged. How many armor enhancements had he been running?

Irritation at both of their carelessness surged. They should know better.

Tex hauled Carolina into her arms, and reached out, seeking the signal of the transport. Finding it, she started heading in that direction.

Epsilon had synced Carolina's vitals with Tex's HUD, and she stared at them absently as she wove her way through the snow and trees.

She just hoped the others had figured things out without her.

Tex opened a channel to Tucker. "You got Doyle?" She asked.

"Yeah, he's alive. We lost the sword though."

Tex cursed. "At least he can't use it," she said, recalling her own frustrations with those swords.

Tucker snickered, obviously remembering the same thing. "Where's Carolina?"

"I've got her," Tex said, spotting the shuttle. "We're on our way."

* * *

Tex, unfortunately, was the one who got to tell Kimball about what happened.

As loathe as she was to leave Carolina, she trusted Doctor Grey enough to leave her for alone to handle _that_ situation.

"Kimball," she said.

Kimball knew her well enough to know that the news wasn't good. "What happened?"

Tex told her as simply as she could. "Doyle got the sword, but then he lost it to Felix."

Kimball yelled, and punched the wall. "Are you _kidding me_? Would it just be too much to ask, for _something_ to go right for once?"

"Alpha was that bad, huh?" Tex asked quietly.

"We lost a lot of people," Kimball said, shoulders slumping. "And I was the one who pushed for that charge." She fell back against the wall. Tex quickly set her motion trackers so that no one could sneak up on them. The last thing either army needed right now was to see Kimball like this. "Felix knew _exactly_ what I'd do," she said, her hands clenched into fists.

Tex was terrible at this comforting thing. This was not even _remotely_ in her programming. "They can't use the sword," she told her, instead of saying any of the words Kimball might need to hear. But then again, knowing the situation wasn't hopeless and they weren't about to all die horrible alien-failsafe deaths was probably an important thing to know.

Kimball straightened up. "Really?"

Tex saw a light on her HUD, telling her that her trackers were going off. She grabbed Kimball and yanked her upright, checking to see if she recognized the person.

She did.

It was Doyle.

"We should get going," Tex said, starting to try to steer Kimball towards the room where she knew the Blues and Reds to be.

Unfortunately, Tex wasn't fast enough.

"Ah. Agent Texas. And Vanessa." Doyle sounded terrified. As he should be, in Tex's opinion. She wasn't in a good mood, and the Federal General tended to only make things worse, in her book.

"How exactly did Felix manage to get his hands on the sword?" Kimball demanded, rounding on Doyle like a shark on the verge of a feeding frenzy. Somehow, she _knew_ that Doyle had screwed up.

Tex sat back to watch the show.

"Ah, well—you see, I'm afraid that I had to choose between dropping the sword off the cliff and dying, or throwing it and living." Doyle shuffled slightly, nervous. "I made the decision to live, rather understandably, I believe."

"You _believe_?" Kimball looked like she was about to charge Doyle. Tex straightened up slightly, knowing she probably shouldn't let the two generals of armies that were on the verge of war as it was duke it out in the hallway of the capital, even though it would probably be one of the funniest things that Tex had seen since Tucker had shown her the video of the Epsilon version of herself beating up Epsilon with his own body. Tex grabbed the two of them and steered them into the next room, where the Reds and Blues had gathered. "Well _good for you!_ " Kimball screamed at Doyle, pushing slightly against Tex's arm.

"Thank you!" Sarge said, cheerfully oblivious to the overall context.

"No, not you! Him!" Tex decided that standing between Kimball and the target of her rage was probably not a good idea, if she wanted to be able to ever have a peaceful conversation with Kimball again. She walked over to Tucker and Caboose, who were watching the ensuing fight like a tennis match.

"It was a split second decision, and I stand by it!" Doyle defended himself, which… honestly did nothing to improve Tex's opinion of the man. Screwing up was one thing. Defending that decision? Tex was not particularly impressed.

"Well, thanks to you, the mercenaries now have the power _to kill us all_!" Kimball shouted.

"Only if I die first!"

"Great! So now we'll get to waste valuable men to guard you twenty-four-seven!"

"Well, we'd have more men if you hadn't led them all into a trap!" Doyle shot back. Tex winced. This was going to get messy.

Kimball's voice got dangerously low. "Don't you _dare_ turn this around on me."

"Okay, _enough!_ " Wash's voice broke through. Tex's eyebrows went up, surprised, despite everything. Washington was really taking the leadership thing seriously. "You two are acting like children!"

"Ha-ha! You're immature!" Grif sang, clearly enjoying someone other than himself being the target of Wash's ire. Tex wondered how often Wash had gone after Grif.

Kimball whirled to face Grif. "Dish duty!"

"Fuck!"

"What's done is done," Wash said, sounding exhausted. "So let's quit focusing on what went wrong and start thinking about what we have now, and what we can start doing."

"Killing Felix seems like a pretty high priority," Tex suggested, tilting her head to one side.

"You've been wanting to kill Felix since before you knew he was a bad guy, no one's really surprised here," Tucker pointed out.

"I'm sorry, are you disagreeing?"

"No, I'm just saying," Tucker said with a shrug.

"How's Church and Carolina?" Simmons asked. Tex turned her attention back to Wash.

Doyle, however, was the one to answer. "Our dear friend Emily has assured me that Carolina will make a full recovery. Uhh, as well as your purple friend from the caves."

Simmons sighed. "Tough luck, can't win 'em all."

"Doc's here?" Tex blinked, surprised.

The others looked at each other. "Oh, _right_ ," Simmons said.

"You, uh, might want to sit down for this," Tucker told her.

" _Tucker_ ," she growled.

"So, Doc kind of got lost in space," Grif said. "Because of the future cubes. And now…"

"He is calling himself O'Malley!" Caboose said.

Tex's mind went eerily calm.

"Kimball, which way is it to the medical wing?" She asked flatly.

" _It's not really him_!" The Reds and Blues looked like they were a second away from dogpiling her.

"Omega was destroyed along with the rest of the AI, Texas," Washington told her. "What's happening with Doc is just a mental anomaly."

"You thought _I_ was destroyed there too," Tex snarled, moving close. "So why am I not comforted?"

"Look, we can have Doctor Grey look for signs of an artificial intelligence in Doc's implants," Wash said, looking like he was a second away from grabbing a hold of her shoulders. Luckily for him, he had enough self-preservation to stop himself. "But I _really_ doubt that Omega would have stayed in Doc for so long. His radios aren't disabled; he could have jumped at any time."

"If you're wrong, I'm going to rip him apart," Tex snarled.

"I believe you," Wash said wryly.

* * *

Tracking Carolina and Epsilon down wasn't too hard. They were standing at the edge of Armonia, arguing.

"You two are both being stupid," Tex snapped. They tensed up at the sight of her. She jammed her finger at Epsilon. " _You_ should have told Carolina about your power limitations _ages ago_. You can't just pretend everything's fine and expect her to be able to work with that." She turned to Carolina. " _And_ you need to _listen_ to him when he tells you he can't do something. You can't run all those enhancements at once." Tex crossed her arms. "And you don't _need_ them, kid. You never did."

Carolina looked away. "The only reason we survived the radio jammer is because Locus is insane! He could've killed Wash, and they both could've done a lot more!"

"But they didn't!" Epsilon protested. "So what does it have to do with anything anyway?"

"I told you when I went through the gateway that I saw the Freelancers... I had to watch them die."

Tex and Epsilon looked at each other.

"And after they were gone, I saw all of you," Carolina glanced at Tex, and she wondered if Carolina had seen her die with the Freelancers, or with the Reds and Blues. "Wash, Tucker, the Reds and..., I _can't_ lose another family."

"You think I'm eager to lose them?" Tex asked. "I saw that too, Carolina. We're _not_ going to let that happen."

"How can we _stop it_? This is so much bigger than us, Texas."

Tex shrugged. "I don't know," she admitted. "But that never stopped the Reds and Blues from trying to fix things, did it?"

Carolina looked at her. "We're not—"

"They're my family too," Tex said. "No one gets to hurt my boys. _Our_ boys," she corrected herself. "We're going to keep them safe."

"Locus—"

"Had a good day, while you had a bad one. Next time you face him, it'll be the opposite. We can _beat them_. That's why we all need to be at our best." She turned to Epsilon, who froze under her gaze. "You need _rest_ , Epsilon," Tex told him, crossing her arms. "Power down for a bit."

"Her healing unit—" Epsilon protested.

"Can run on its own for a while. That's one of the advantages of that particular enhancement. Or, if it's that urgent, _I_ can run it." She glanced at Carolina.

"I don't know if she'd be cool with that." Epsilon sounded nervous.

"Do it," Carolina snapped, a clear indicator that she really did need the healing unit running. But she was also worried for Epsilon. Enough to let Tex do this. "Epsilon, _log off_."

The memory AI flickered out.

"Don't worry, I won't go rooting around in your brain," Tex said, before slipping out of her armor.

"Have you ever even done this before?"

"I've only ever run my own stuff," Tex admitted. But Epsilon had left paths running through Carolina's armor—invisible to anyone but another AI, acting as a guiding path to what she needed to do.

Carolina couldn't hide the spike of relief she felt when Tex turned up the healing unit. Epsilon had it set fairly low—at least he was being smart about it.

"How bad is he?" Carolina asked, once she'd checked to make sure Epsilon was completely powered down.

"Bad. He was the last fragment, so… he's smaller." Tex said. "And whatever he did in Wash's head did some damage as well. Throwing off memories, trying to kill himself… there's problems there that wouldn't have happened with Delta or Theta."

"Can we fix him?" Carolina asked, and Tex nearly startled at the wave of affection and fear she felt coming out of her.

"Maybe," Tex said. "We just need time, Lopez, and maybe Simmons."

"Time's the hardest one of those," Carolina said quietly.

"Like I said," Tex moved her projection slightly, so Carolina could see her better. "You guys have me. I can keep an eye on him. You just need to be careful about your armor enhancements until we can help him."

Carolina took a deep breath. "Thanks," she said quietly. Tex blinked, surprised.

"Hey, he's one of my boys," Tex said. "Like I told Tucker, I'm the only one who gets to kill them."

Carolina laughed, and she looked startled by it.

"They've changed you," she observed.

"They do that. Not like you and Wash are the same people from Freelancer," Tex shrugged.

"True," Carolina said.

There was a long, drawn out pause, as they both tried to see if the other would speak first. But sharing a brain meant that they couldn't ignore the subject that they both were reluctant to broach.

"Ask," Tex said, moving her projection to sit on Carolina's shoulder.

Carolina closed her eyes. "Why York?" _So many others, why did you take him from me, why'd he chose you, why didn't you come to me?_ Carolina's mind spun out in a thousand directions, and Tex caught them all, implanted as she was. It was so hard to try to be respectful when she was like this, so hard to not pry.

Tex answered as honestly as she could. "I could trust him. I knew that he'd want to help. He had an AI, so Delta would back me up. And a locksmith wasn't a bad trait for a partner to have when you want to break in somewhere."

Carolina took a deep breath. "Why'd you split up?"

Sometimes, Tex wished they hadn't. They'd found each other quickly enough, swapping information about what had happened to them while on the Mother of Invention. She'd watched him break as she told him about Carolina, about Maine.

Then they'd ran. They'd worked well together. It had been with him that she'd become a mercenary at first, taking jobs, running away from Freelancer, the program always hot on their tail. They'd stolen a ship, and they

And then Omega had learned to jump.

The first time he'd jumped into York, it had been during a surveillance mission that they'd picked up for easy money. One minute, things had been fine, but the next, York started laughing and killed the men they were supposed to be spying on.

Then a minute later, Omega had jumped back, leaving York standing in a base full of corpses, and Delta crying out as he managed to regain control over York's implants.

"Did you know he could do that?" York had demanded as they stumbled back into the ship.

"No!" He'd believed her. But that hadn't changed anything.

They'd stuck together another two weeks. But Omega had _loved_ jumping to York, loved mocking Tex with the voice of her friend, throwing her fears back at her. It had taken them a few days to realize that radio silence was the way to avoid it, but they were on the run from Freelancer, and they hadn't lost them yet. Sometimes avoiding using the radios just wasn't an option. And running was so much harder when one of them couldn't be trusted part of the time, and with Delta useless.

Tex was the one who left. But the way York had looked at her, dark circles under his eyes as he saw her standing there, her bag thrown over her shoulders, told her that he had known it was coming.

"Look after yourself, Allison," he'd told her, his grin crooked and tired. "Don't worry about me."

"I don't worry," Tex had said, the lie easy. York's eye twinkled—he'd known. He might be a terrible liar, but he could spot her bullshit easily. She walked away, and she wouldn't see him again until she needed him to take down Omega and Wyoming, years later.

She opened her thoughts to Carolina, showing her everything. She felt Carolina's breath hitch as she sifted through the memories. She felt how Carolina lingered over York's smile, the rush of guilt when she saw York grieving her.

No secrets. Not like this.

"Oh, _York_ ," Carolina said softly. She wasn't crying, but it was close. She paused. "You miss him too," she said, quietly.

Tex swallowed her instinct to deny it. "He was my friend."

Carolina swallowed. Tex wished she wasn't in her head, knowing just how close Carolina was to crying. She had no right to see this.

"I'm sorry," Carolina said quietly. "It's not—you didn't—" _Get him killed_. It was a nice thought. Too bad Tex didn't believe it.

"It's fine," she said quietly. "Now, we should probably get going. We have a war to win."

* * *

"We're doing roleplaying!" Doc told her. Tex paused for a long moment, making sure she'd heard what she thought she'd heard.

Checking her memory banks told her that she had indeed, heard that.

There was only one solution here.

"I'm gone."

Grif grabbed her arm tightly, trying to stop her from leaving. "If we're going down, you're coming with us," he hissed.

Tex stared at him, incredulous. "Do you _want_ to lose that hand?" Grif reluctantly let go of her, but didn't run away.

"C'mon! It'll be fun!" Donut said, beaming at her. "I've got dibs on police officer, but there's lots of fun options left! I bet you do a _great_ —"

"Please don't finish that sentence," Simmons begged.

Donut huffed, propping his hands on his hips. "Honestly Simmons, I don't know why you're so scared! Roleplaying is a great opportunity to explore—"

" _He doesn't mean that kind of roleplaying, Donut,_ " Simmons yelled, throwing his hands up in the air.

Tex began to circumvent the bickering Reds, making for the door.

Unfortunately, Kimball blocked her exit.

"If I have to go through with this, you do too," she said through what sounded like gritted teeth. "You _owe me,_ Texas."

"Tucker told you how much I hated owing people, didn't he?" Tex said, groaning.

"He made a pamphlet. Captain Caboose illustrated it."

Tex aimed a glare in Tucker's direction. He had the audacity to wave at her. She was going to make him spar with her later, Tex decided.

That was when Doc did that fucking _laugh_ again. She went for her pistol on pure instinct, only for Sarge to stop her, sticking his shotgun between her and her weapon.

"Doctor Grey checked again," he reminded her. "She says he's _probably_ not possessed by yer AI. Just some sort of multi-personality whats-it."

"And you _believe her_?" Tex hissed, listening as Doc monologued about his long-awaited vengeance.

"Believe me, I would love nothing more than to fill that no-good medic with bullets! From my shotgun!"

"But we did _kind of_ leave him behind and forget about him for several months," Simmons said. "So we kind of owe him? I guess. Don't kill him."

"I didn't forget him, I didn't even know he was on this planet!" Tex couldn't help but pointing out.

"Yeah, but in case you haven't noticed, we're still pretty fucked," Grif pointed out. "So, might as well make sure that the guy with the extremely dangerous second personality is on our side."

"Besides, Donut might cry if you kill his boyfriend," Simmons said.

Tex's eyebrows shot up. "Doc? And _Donut_?"

"Tenían una granja. Yo era un espantapájaros. Mi vida era una agonía," Lopez said. "Pero seguía siendo mejor que la vida en este miserable planeta. Por lo menos yo estaba solo."

"It happened sometime after Wash shot Donut," Simmons told her w

ith a shrug. "We _really_ don't want to ask."

"Tenía que escuchar a su noviazgo durante semanas. No podía desactivar mi audiencia. Yo odiaba cada segundo de ella," Lopez added.

"You're _right_ Lopez!" Donut said, wandering up to them. "We _should_ get started!"

Tex wondered, not for the first time, if it was possible for an AI to have an auto-pilot function. Maybe she could just power down for an hour. She doubted anyone would notice.

"C'mon, don't be shy! Look, it's easy!" Doc said enthusiastically, turning to Tex. "Tex, why don't you pretend to be me, and I'll pretend to be you!"

"Are you _sure_ I can't kill him?" She asked Sarge quietly.

"Please don't," Wash said to her. "Believe me, I know it's tempting."

Tex groaned, and prepared for a session of pure agony.

* * *

Tex was running out of creative ways to plan to kill Felix, and it was annoying her.

She couldn't fucking believe them. Coming to Armonia was a terrible idea in pretty much every way.

She hoped they had enough time.

"Run ahead cloaked," Carolina told her, Kimball and Wash by her side. "We're right behind you."

Tex knew Armonia very well by now. She hadn't bothered pretending to sleep here, and she'd taken her time to get to know it. It was familiar now. Not home—there was only one place in the entire galaxy that was home, and the canyon was long out of reach by now. But familiar.

The plan was a good one. Tex scouted ahead, trying to make sure that their path was clear, killing any pirate that was in her path.

She was really getting sick of these people giving black armor a bad name. She gave the nearest corpse an extra kick, just for that.

"Assholes," she grumbled.

Then she received Epsilon's signal.

 _We've got Sharkface!_ He said. _C's bent on facing him alone, but uh, mind giving us an assist here?_

 _With pleasure,_ Tex sent back. She'd let him get away last time.

This time? He was _hers_. And Carolina's. She could share. Character growth and all that.

She raced past Kimball and Wash without a word. Sharkface and Carolina were on the street level. One good jump allowed Tex to join them without much difficulty.

"Something's gotten into you," Sharkface was saying. "And I'm going to rip it out!"

Tex, never one for the concept of honorable fighting, punched the back of his helmet. "Not if I have anything to say about it," she said, allowing her camouflage to fall.

"Wondered when you'd show up," Carolina said, an honest smile in her voice.

"Sorry," Tex said, cracking her neck. "Got held up."

The two of them turned to face Sharkface. Tex grinned.

This was going to be _good_.

She hadn't fought Sharkface before, not really. Carolina had told her he'd been at the tower that she'd blown up (oops), but she'd never fought him then, or on Chorus.

She'd always just missed him.

He roared, and charged them, his gauntlets shooting streams of fire.

Fighting alongside Carolina was almost like a well-practiced dance. Even back at Freelancer, when they'd worked together it had been smooth and sleek, even if it would only be for brief moments. Now, when they were united in their tasks, they were close to unstoppable.

Their styles were incredibly different, but they knew how the other worked, and used that.

Carolina charged first, spinning around deliver a powerful scissor kick, which he dodged. Tex followed up by grabbing him and slamming him into the ground. He got up, spitting mad, and ran at them.

Sharkface tried to punch Carolina, but she caught the punch and threw him to one side, where Tex eagerly pounced on him.

So this guy brought out her vicious side. So what?

" _Carolina, Tex? It's Wash. When can you get to the LZ?_ "

Tex leapt over a kick, and then punched Sharkface in the helmet, wondering if she could possibly get the visor to shatter if she got the angle right. Carolina shouted. "Kind of hard to say!"

" _Well, we're going to need you guys pretty damn soon. Doyle's riding to the reactor._ "

"Doyle?" They chorused. Tex paused long enough for Sharkface actually to punch her, knocking her down. Carolina quickly moved in.

" _Long story. Kimball and I are heading back to help you._ "

"We've got this!" Tex snapped, as Carolina put Sharkface down hard.

The man got to his feet, firing up his flamethrowers again. "You think you're so tough! But the two of you are pathetic—I'm going to _crush you_ —"

Tex shot him three times. Once through the helmet, twice in the chest.

"I am so _bored_ of assholes talking too much," Tex said. "He dead?"

Carolina shot the body. "Probably."

"Let's go meet Kimball and Wash then."

* * *

Doyle was dead.

Tex couldn't help but feel like the universe is pulling a joke on her. One ridiculous cosmic joke. And the punchline was this: failure.

Again.

She never even _liked_ him, Tex couldn't help but think as she looked around.

Felix was alive. Doyle was dead. The pirates had the sword.

And Kimball was blaming herself. And Carolina and Epsilon had pushed themselves too far again.

Every time Tex closed her eyes, she kept seeing cliffs and snowbanks and golden armor. Alpha's voice saying, " _I'm so tired_ ," echoed in her mind.

Tex hadn't like Doyle. Far from it.

But Tex had never handled failure well.

Kimball made a rousing speech, and everyone cheered. Tex remained silent, contemplating. She turned to Carolina and Wash.

"How about we take the fight to them this time?" Tex asked.

"Just the three of us?" Wash asked, glancing between her and Carolina.

"Four," Epsilon corrected. "And _hell yeah_!"

"That sounds good," Tucker said, walking up to them. "But I've got a _plan_."

The three Freelancers exchanged looks. "Oh, this should be good."

* * *

Tex stood between Carolina and Wash, smirking as Felix groaned at the sight of them. "No way..."

"Hello boys," Carolina greeted.

"So, you've chosen to make a final stand," Locus observed. Tex let her eyes flicker towards him—she hadn't seen him in a while. He looked about the same as ever.

Epsilon appeared between her and Carolina. "These three couldn't resist a rematch." Tex cracked her knuckles, smirking beneath her helmet.

"Admirable, but hopeless," Locus said.

"Three on two," she said. It wasn't really fair, but then, Tex didn't particularly give a shit. "I'm liking those odds, aren't you Carolina?"

"Think about what you're doing!" Wash said, ignoring Tex's banter. Tex sighed. Wash took being the good guy so seriously, sometimes. These two didn't deserve another chance, didn't deserve to walk away. "If you activate this temple, it kills everyone. Our soldiers _and_ yours."

"That's war, Wash. Not everyone makes it back," Felix said glibly, and Tex _knew_ those words. He'd said them to Tucker. Oh, Tex was _really_ going to enjoy ripping him apart.

"They can if you turn away. You can choose to end this now!" Tex found herself staring slightly as Locus turned away, as if considering it for a moment. But Felix pulled Locus back into line easily, and Tex knew where this was going.

"If the four of you are here, I can only assume the rest are attempting to access the Communication Temple," Locus said grimly.

"That's right," Carolina said. Tex almost felt bad, pulling the rug out from under the two mercenaries for the second time, but then she remembered Felix gleefully planning to kill her boys, and she opted to savor the moment instead.

"You'd really put that much faith in them?" Locus asked.

"We're not too worried," Epsilon said, clearly as amused by this as she was. She reached out slightly, nudging him. _Don't give it away_ , she scolded.

 _I won't, I won't! Geeze._

Tex heard the shouts coming in over the radio, and couldn't stop herself from grinning.

"Sounds like you're the ones that should be worried," Carolina said.

They were all maybe enjoying this a bit too much. But honestly, Tex was never going to get tired of people underestimating the Reds and Blues. Sure, she tended to be one of them, but there was still enough schadenfreude in seeing other people fall into that trap that she could savor it.

Felix scoffed. "As if." He and Locus raised their weapons in unison, and the Freelancers all went for cover.

Tex grabbed her rifle as she glanced at Wash. "I go high, you go low?"

"Sounds good," he said, and with a nod from Carolina, the three of them returned fire, driving the mercenaries back behind cover.

Locus, however, was not a sniper for nothing, and a well-placed shot from him sent Carolina's gun spiraling out of her hands. "Damn it! He's a hell of a shot."

"Yeah he is," Wash took out a grenade. Tex grinned, and nodded at him.

Wash threw the grenade, which forced Locus's attention away. Tex rolled out from her cover, firing at Locus. She might be better with her hands than with weapons, but Locus still was forced to drop his precious sniper rifle. Felix tried to cover his partner, and Tex threw herself forward to Carolina's cover.

"You hit?"

"Not a scratch!" Tex said. They all leapt out from their cover to move to offensive.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Tex snarled as she spotted Felix charging them, his shield sending up sparks as it scraped along the ground. Tex sunk low, preparing to vault over it, when Locus leapt up from behind him, throwing grenades.

They all rolled out of the way. This almost felt familiar, working with them. Even though Tex had rarely fought with them directly, she knew their styles. She'd seen them work, and she'd gone through all the same drills that they had.

"He's heading for the back entrance!" Carolina yelled, and Tex blinked, surprised, as she saw that Locus had made his way to the strange floating platforms that surrounded the temple.

"Go!" Wash yelled, reloading his rifle. "We'll hold the front!"

Tex didn't need to be told twice. She and Wash turned on Felix, and even though she'd worked with the former Freelancer rookie even less than she'd worked with Carolina, they still had trained together enough on Chorus to know what to do.

Wash opened fire at Felix, who blocked with his shield. Wash nodded at Tex, and then jumped out, forcing Felix to move his shield up to continue avoiding the spray of bullets.

Tex charged, slamming against Felix, toppling him over. Unfortunately, it also sent Wash flying, and Tex had to waste time grabbing Wash to stop him from falling off the edge of the pathway. By the time Wash got up again, Felix had his knives out, and threw.

Tex ducked, but Wash freaking _caught_ one of them. Tex almost laughed. She'd forgotten about that.

"Huh?" Felix was clearly shocked.

"You think you're the only one who's good with knives?" Wash was clearly grinning behind his helmet, tossing it up and catching it.

Felix growled, and charged, his energy sword lighting up. Tex camouflaged, twisting to the side so that she could punch the side of Felix's helmet. But Felix was better than most people at spotting her, and he slashed out, forcing Tex backwards. Taking advantage, Felix began to charge towards the temple.

"Carolina!" Wash yelled, and Tex's gaze jerked upwards, spotting Locus and Carolina floating above them. Carolina's grappling gun fired, attaching itself to Felix's leg and pulling him off the edge.

Unfortunately, he was dragged too close to Wash, yanking him off with him. "Damn it!" Tex grabbed Wash and tried to pull him back, but the combined force was too much, and the three of them all went toppling off.

" _Oh my god!_ " Wash shrieked, flailing.

"If you drop my body, I'm implanting in you," Tex hissed to Wash.

"Don't even joke about that," Wash snapped, but his grip on her hand tightened.

"You drop me, you drop all three of us!" Felix taunted Carolina.

"Do _not_ drop him!" Wash yelled. Tex sighed. Rookies.

Carolina tugged, and the three of them landed on the underside of the platform, their grav-boots activating.

"Oh, now this is just ridiculous!" Felix snapped.

"We've had worse," Wash sighed. Tex was inclined to agree.

Felix charged them. Wash ducked, and Tex moved to grab his arm, forcing it up. Felix threw her off, but Wash went for it next. If they got the sword, they could end this a lot faster. Wash twisted Felix's arm, and the sword sunk into the platform.

"Wash!" Carolina yelled. Tex quickly pulled herself topside, just in time to stop Locus from punching Carolina.

"He's working on it!" Tex said, wrenching Locus as far back as she could, forcing him away from Carolina. He twisted out of her grip, ending up on the opposite end of the platform.

She charged Locus, slamming her fist into his throat before he had a chance to get off another shot. He stumbled backwards, and she followed it up with a roundhouse kick, then ducked low so that Carolina could fire her gun at Locus.

"Agent Texas," Locus growled, sounding actually peeved. Maybe it was because she'd been spending too much time with the Reds and Blues, but she couldn't help but be satisfied that she'd made the grim mercenary emote. "And here I thought you were a _professional_."

"I don't know if you've noticed this, asshole," Tex said. "But it seems to me that wiping out this planet involves killing me. Seems like that's not unprofessionalism. Sounds like it's just fucking common sense." She charged again. He blocked her punch to the helmet, and retaliated with a strike to her shoulder. Tex rolled with it, allowing herself to fall, before pushing herself back up to her feet so that Carolina could move in.

"I've been waiting for this for a while," Felix's voice hissed in her ear, and then he had her in a chokehold with one arm, and sunk his knife in her shoulder all the way up to the hilt.

If Tex needed air, or had pain centers, that probably would be a difficult position to be in.

She felt him freeze against her as her body threw off sparks. Damn, he'd gotten the shoulder that already had a hole in it. She'd really have to go to Sarge for repairs now.

"How many times will it take for you to figure this out, cockbite?" Tex asked, throwing him over her head, and slammed her foot into his stomach, sending him sprawling.

"That trick doesn't work on me!" She yanked out the knife and threw it at his hand.

"What the fuck are you?" He yelled. She was still throwing off sparks. He'd done more damage than she'd thought initially. Oh well. She could still get the job done.

She heard Wash shout a warning, and managed to duck just in time. When they cleared, Locus and Felix were gone. Felix was flipping them off with the hand Tex hadn't stabbed.

"Really?" Wash asked, sounding out of breath.

"Texas, you have a grapple?" Carolina demanded.

"Yes," Tex grabbed hers.

"Hold on. We'll cut them off," Carolina grabbed Wash, and they fired their grappling hooks in unison.

Wash screamed. How was it that the Reds and Blues were scared of him? Tex had clearly left them alone too long; their standards had dropped.

An explosion forced them to land early. Tex grabbed Carolina, steadying her, before the familiar sight of a plasma blade split the platform they were standing on.

"Jump!" Carolina yelled, and they did so. Carolina and Felix immediately went at it. Tex moved to join, before she heard Wash's noise of confusion.

"Huh?"

Tex spun around, and sure enough, Locus was gone. Tex growled.

"Oh no you don't!" She launched herself at the familiar shimmer, colliding with Locus. She punched him in the helmet. "You don't get to pull that fucking trick on me! I _invented_ that trick!"

Locus pushed her off, and tried to go for Wash, but Wash managed to hit him with the throwing knife he'd gotten off Felix, injuring the merc.

"Hi there," Wash grinned. Tex rolled her eyes, and paused to try to trip Felix. Wash could take care of himself for a little while.

She and Carolina had just punched Felix in unison (a moment that Tex had recorded because it was a beautiful thing that Tucker would get a kick out of), when she heard Locus call out for assistance.

"Felix!"

Felix slashed at Carolina, actually managing to hit her. Tex went to help her, pulling her to her feet just in time to see Wash duck out of the way of the sword, which slammed into the power center of the platform they were on.

"Oh… shit," Felix said. Tex gritted her teeth, but the platform was already teetering, and she needed to focus on her grav-boots.

As they jumped onto the same walkway as before, Tex wanted to laugh. They'd just gotten the all-clear from Doctor Grey.

They'd almost won.

"Back to square one," Carolina said.

"Alright, guys. This has been fun but...if you could just keel over and die already, that'd be great!" Felix and Locus were both looking worse-for-wear, while only Carolina had been injured so far. And Tex's arm. But it wasn't going to slow her down, and Epsilon was already running Carolina's healing unit.

"What's wrong buddy... getting tired?" Wash mocked. He'd clearly seen the message from Grey. Tex smirked.

"I'm not tired. You're tired! I can do this shit all day!" Felix seethed, panting.

"We know. In fact, we kinda planned on it..." Wash was smug, not that Tex blamed him for that. She only wished she'd managed to take off Felix's helmet beforehand, so she could see his expression when he realized what they'd pulled.

"The fuck is that supposed to mean?" Felix demanded. "Christ, man! Always with the cryptic one-liners..."

Carolina laughed. "We don't have to beat you, we just had to waste your time."

"What are you talking about?" Locus demanded, clearly having cottoned on to something being wrong.

"What she's trying to say, is that you two have already lost," Epsilon said.

"Oh, really? And when exactly did that happen?" Felix wasn't understanding yet. Good.

Tex cracked her neck. "The minute Doyle killed half your guys back in Armonia."

"See, we may have lost our whole base..." Epsilon said, clearly enjoying this as much as the Freelancers. "But you just left yours wide open."

Bitters' voice rang over the radio. "Hope you Freelancers are ready!"

" _What_?" Felix's voice was something Tex would savor for the rest of her life.

"You crash our ship, we crash yours!" Epsilon crowed.

"Run!" Carolina called, and the three of them began to sprint for safety. She skidded to a stop, and yelled. " _Epsilon!_ "

"On it!" The AI yelled, and Tex yanked Wash down to the ground, just in case, doing her best to cover the rookie Freelancer with her body even as the bubble shield emerged.

The collision rocked the world in a way that would have Tucker saying bow-chicka-bow-wow for the rest of the year. Carolina fell down, colliding with Tex as the force shook her off her feet.

As the air cleared, they slowly got up.

"Okay…" Wash coughed. "Let's never do that again."

"I don't know, I thought it was fun," Tex said, grinning as she got to her feet.

"You're insane," Wash told her.

"Epsilon… we did it," Carolina said, as if she couldn't believe it. Tex reached out a hand, and Carolina grabbed it, pulling herself up.

"Yeah, we always had a knack for breaking things," Epsilon said. "C'mon, let's get back to Kimball and the others. I'm sure they miss us already."

"They're missing Wash, maybe," Tex said, rolling her eyes.

"Are you seriously doubting Caboose's ability to miss me?" Epsilon demanded.

Tex snorted, checking her shoulder again.

"It's not sparking anymore," Carolina said to her. "But you _really_ need to get repairs this time."

"Yeah, yeah," Tex muttered, prodding the thin slit in her under suit where the knife had gone in idly. "I'll be fine." She cut off whatever Carolina was going to say. "But fine. I'll go see if Sarge has a robot repair kit." She rolled her eyes. "Don't fuss."

"You two might have the strangest relationship ever. Of all time."

"Says the man who flirts by making Tucker run laps," Tex said.

Wash began to splutter, much to Carolina and Tex's mutual amusement.

* * *

The main fight was a mess. Everywhere pirates were dying, and alien tech was flying around, causing plenty of explosions. Tex laughed as she, Tucker, Wash, and Carolina wove their way through it all.

"Tex! Carolina! Wash! You made it!" Kimball's relief was obvious as she looked at them.

"Sorry we're late. Blowing up a death machine takes longer than you'd think," Wash said.

"Well we _did_ manage to kill two mercs with one stone," Carolina said. Tex grinned behind her helmet, jostling her shoulder.

"Aw dude, did they go out like bitches, or was it slow and painful?" Grif demanded, eager.

"What kind of messed up question is _that_?" Tucker demanded, as if he didn't want to know just as badly.

"Incineration by explosion," Wash said.

"Aw hell yeah! Straight up Freelancer justice!" Tucker cheered.

"Was it everything you dreamed, Tex?" Kimball asked slyly.

"I didn't get to actually rip off any limbs, so—" Tex shrugged. She grinned. "I _did_ get to stab him with his own knife though. I'm content."

"Yeah yeah, may they burn in hell," Epsilon said, materializing next to Carolina. "We still need to get Tucker to the tower controls. There's a teleporter down the hall that'll take us to the Control Room. Once we broadcast our message, Charon will have no reason left to fight."

"Then let's push our way to the teleporter," Carolina began, before loud sounds began.

" _Run away!_ " Caboose screamed, and he ran in, followed by Doc and Donut.

In the end, Carolina and Wash stayed to fight the Mantis. Tex and the boys went to the control room.

She and Tucker were to be the last two to go through the teleporter.

And that was when she heard it.

"Hello Agent Texas."

If Tex had nightmares, that voice would haunt them. She reacted without thinking. She shoved Tucker through the teleporter. "Go!" She yelled.

He didn't need to see this.

None of them did.

The Counsellor looked just like she remembered him. His smile was as placid as always, and he even wore a similar uniform.

She hadn't seen him since before Sidewinder. The day she'd ran, the day she'd grabbed York and whispered, " _I need to talk to you_ ," she'd had a session with him. She'd spent the entirety of it wondering if it would be possible for her to rip his head clean from his shoulders. What was the point of robotic strength if she couldn't?

She hadn't seen him since; Wash had told her he'd survived the crash. Carolina had mentioned he'd been arrested for his crimes.

But it seemed like that hadn't stayed true for very long.

Tex saw red, and lunged without thinking, intent on the kill. All thoughts of following after the boys, of breaking the siege, of sending for help were gone from her mind. All that mattered was that the Counsellor was here, and that she was going to _kill him_ for every single thing he'd done.

Before she'd reached him, however, the Counsellor smiled at her. "I wouldn't if I were you, Agent Texas." There was something in his hand. Tex's sensors immediately identified it and she drew back, eyes wide beneath her helmet.

"You fucker," she hissed. An EMP. He'd come prepared. And a dead man's switch, clutched in his hand.

"I was expecting you much earlier," he said calmly. "Truly, it's been so long since we've last spoken. I suppose you got… caught up with Felix and Locus."

The way he said those names with such casual familiarity sent a bolt of lightning down her spine. "You were working with them," she hissed, the pieces clicking into place. No wonder they'd known to recruit Sharkface.

"I offered them my services. They were very interested in my information on Carolina and Washington," he said. "And then they told me _you_ had survived."

Tex had never heard him speak with so much inflection. Her lips curled sardonically under her helmet.

"Mad at me for upsetting your little _experiments_ , Counsellor?" He always had been a sick fuck.

"You undid _years_ of work, Agent Texas," the Counsellor's eyes darkened. "We gave you _everything_ , and you tore it all down. And for what?"

"You ripped us apart!" Tex snapped, every scrap of rage she'd ever felt rising to the surface, threatening to boil over.

 _Gave her everything_. They'd torn her apart from Alpha, they'd put her in a suit of armor, and then they'd filled her with lies. They'd given her Omega, given her enhancements, and then they had her kill for them.

"You destroyed him!" There could only be one _him_ in this context, and they both knew it.

"Tell me, Agent Texas," the Counsellor said. "How does it feel, knowing you've failed? The Alpha is dead. Agent Washington killed him, did you know that?"

Tex gritted her teeth, trying to figure out the angles. She needed him dead; the thought was in every fiber of her being, every inch of herself. Every scrap of code was re-writing itself to be about _killing him_.

"Now they're all dead, and it's because of you, Texas. Without you, all of this would _never_ have happened." The Counselor's voice had once been vaguely comforting, Tex knew that. She'd thought it soothing, and had believed him when he spoke. She'd trusted him. They all had. It had been one of their biggest mistakes.

He was saying nothing that Tex hadn't told herself before. But hearing it from him brought her back into focus.

"They're dead because of _you_! You ripped us apart, you set us against each other, and for what? For an AI too damaged to function, for soldiers who stabbed each other in the back? For a war that we fought against each other instead of the enemy?" Tex yelled. "You destroyed us—the AI _and_ the humans!"

Getting out the grenade was all too easy.

"Interesting," he said, and oh, how Tex hated that word. "And in which group do you count yourself, Agent Texas? The AI, or the human?"

A scientist to the end, Tex thought bitterly. "Oh you know," she said, pulling the pin behind her back. "A little bit of both!"

She threw it, and it landed at Price's feet, and he stared at it for a moment too long, before his finger lifted from the dead man's switch. "Son of a—"

The Counselor had never known Tex had learned to jump. That ability had been Alpha's. Then Omega had learned to do it, and he had wreaked havoc, ripping up minds and planning to destroy the world, growing more and more powerful as he learned. Then Epsilon had inherited the ability, like the Alpha before him.

But it had also been _hers_. Had been since Donut killed her, that day in the canyon.

Tex _jumped_. Through the wires that ran through the base, following them to safety, away, away, away.

There was an explosion behind her.

Tex flickered back, travelling along the same wires that had carried her away.

She projected herself out onto the floor. There was a corpse there, along with the mangled remains of her body. She nudged it with her foot. It was too damaged. She couldn't jump back in. The EMP had done a great job at frying everything. She'd be lucky if she could get her camouflage unit running again.

She glanced back at the body of the Counsellor. It looked terrible.

"That was for them," she told him. "You fucker."

Then she went to find her boys.

* * *

Implanting in Tucker was simultaneously a horrifying and fascinating experience, Tex decided. She was just in his storage unit, like Epsilon, not truly implanting, which was good. But still. It was an experience, that's for sure.

"Next time, maybe I should just possess Lopez again," she said idly as they ran through the hallways.

"¡No vienen cerca de mis procesadores de nuevo!" Lopez snapped.

"There's gotta be some sort of directory we can access," Simmons said, distracting the AI from their argument. "Maybe it can lead us to—"

"Access denied! Intruder detected!"

Epsilon and Tex both reeled back, shocked. _It can't be,_ Tex said.

 _Know anyone else who sounds like that?_

 _You said she was destroyed!_

 _Looks like we were wrong!_

Meanwhile, the boys were yelling. "Ah! Shit!" Simmons screamed.

"Quick, hit escape!" Grif suggested.

" Control-Alt-Delete!" Was Tucker's contribution.

"FILSS?" Epsilon asked, appearing.

"What are you doing here?" Tex asked.

The color of the panel changed. "Director? Agent Texas? Is that you?"

 _She thinks you're the Director?_

 _It's a long story._

"It's _Sheila!_ " Caboose cheered.

"¿Sheila? ¿Eres tú?" Lopez asked. "¡Te he echado mucho! Me quedé solo, rodeado de estos idiotas."

"FILSS what are you doing here? I thought you were destroyed!" Epsilon asked. Tex could feel his concern for the other AI.

"I was recovered and illegally reassigned after your passing! Oh, but it is _good_ to see you again." FILSS sounded as genuinely fond as she could. Tex grinned.

"Trust me, the feeling is mutual! We need you to shut off the androids your boss just dropped on our friends!"

"That would be in direct violation of Chairman Hargrove's orders—"

"FILSS!" Tex said.

"I would love to!" FILSS finished. If FILSS had a visual interface, Tex imagined that she would be smiling a smile that Caboose would find hard to match.

"What? Really?" Epsilon was shocked.

"Yes! I dislike him very much!"

"Hey, so do we!" Donut exclaimed. "Small world!"

"Initiating MANTIS deactiva—t—i—on—" FILSS broke off.

Hargrove's face appeared. "I don't _think_ so!"

Tex felt another surge of rage. It was probably a good thing she didn't have a physical body, she mused. Otherwise, she'd have terrible blood pressure.

"Hargrove," Tex growled while the boys screamed.

"He's… so… _bald_!" Caboose sounded legitimately horrified.

"You soldiers have been a thorn in my side for far too long, but _my_ soldiers remain loyal to the end!" Hargrove was seething. Tex couldn't help but feel slightly proud about that, even as she started to prepare for battle.

"Something tells me we're about to have company..." Sarge growled.

"There they are!" Tex and Epsilon spun, preparing for combat, when a rocket flew through the air, slamming into the soldiers that had approached them.

"Fly, you fools!" Doc said, in the voice of O'Malley. Tex growled, but she really didn't have time to deal with that right now.

* * *

Time slowed down. "Epsilon!" Tex said, worry knotting in the stomach she no longer had. "What are you doing?"

"I can't run the suit, Tex," Epsilon said, shoulders slumping. "But if I fracture myself—"

Tex _lunged_. They were both made of ones and zeroes, she couldn't really hit him. But she did her best try.

"Don't you _dare_!" She yelled. "Don't you _dare_ do this to them!"

"Tex, they might _die_! You ran the numbers too!"

"Carolina and Wash are on their way!" Tex yelled.

"They won't make it in time!"

"Yes, they _will_!" Tex grabbed him and shook him. "You have _me,_ Epsilon! You don't have to do this alone!"

"You—"

"I know you're worried. I am too. But don't you _dare_ do this to them. To _me_."

"She is right, Epsilon," the memory of Delta said, flickering into view. Tex stared. She'd known they had existed, but she'd never seen the memories of the other fragments before. "With Beta helping us, the odds—"

"We're still not _there_!" Epsilon cried.

"We're close enough!" Tex said.

"They'll _die_!"

"No, they _won't_!" Tex took a breath that she didn't need to take without lungs. "Have some faith in them, Epsilon. You boys are pretty damn good at surviving."

He flickered, surprised. "I'm—I'm included there?"

Tex crossed her arms. "You're an idiot. Of course you are."

"You said I'm not—"

"And you're not," Tex said flatly. "Doesn't mean you're not one of my boys."

Epsilon stared at her like he'd never seen her before.

"Alright," he said finally, and she didn't think she was imagining the smile in his voice. "Let's do this."

Time sped up again.

The two of them turned.

And all hell broke loose.

* * *

Tex opened her eyes.

"That took a while," Carolina said.

Tex groaned, stretching. "Transfer took a while, I guess." She glanced at Carolina. "The boys alright?"

"They're all fine."

"Caboose awake yet?"

"He woke up a while ago, but then went to sleep again. He was worried about you."

Tex snorted. "Epsilon?"

"He's with Tucker." Carolina held out her hand, and Tex took it, hauling herself upright. "We found the Counselor's body. What did he _do_?"

"EMP," Tex said, starting to stretch. Her new body was stiff. "Wanted revenge, I guess."

Carolina sighed. "I should have known he was involved." Tex shook her head.

"He's a slippery bastard," Tex said. "Kept his head down until he had to."

Carolina ran her fingers through her hair. It was odd to see her completely out of armor. "Still."

"They recover my armor?"

"It's mostly unusable," Tex winced. "Sarge and Doctor Grey think they can get your camouflage unit working again, though."

"I guess that's all I really need," Tex said, grimacing.

"You haven't looked at the mirror yet," Carolina said.

Tex paused. "I figured I'd look the same," she said, confused. Her arms were clean now, the skin smooth and whole. Her processors weren't seeing anything different.

Carolina smiled. "Not quite."

Tex frowned, and turned to find the mirror.

Her stomach dropped.

There was a resemblance to her old face, but there were differences at well. _Familiar_ differences.

She turned to Carolina. "You told Sarge—"

"Epsilon told me about what you did," Carolina said quietly. "And you're not her. You never were. But that—that doesn't make you not family." Her smile was faint. "No reason for you not to look the part."

Tex didn't say anything. She didn't have to. She just gave Carolina a quick nod, and then turned the door, as Kimball came in, carrying a helmet.

"The UNSC will be here in three hours," Kimball said, throwing the helmet to Tex. She caught it, blinking. "Suit up."

It was a New Republic helmet. "What are you planning?"

"We're not letting you get dragged off to a lab somewhere," Carolina said.

"So, we're saying that the mysterious mercenary Allison died in a heroic take down of one Aiden Price," Kimball said. "You're just another face in the crowd."

"Didn't the guys do this for Wash?" Tex asked, raising an eyebrow before spinning the new helmet.

"Well, we don't have a convenient dead guy for you to take the place of," Kimball said wryly. "But that's the general idea."

Tex snorted, putting it on her head. "Guess we'll figure out what happens next later."

There was a faint explosion.

" _Goddamit_ Caboose!"

"Tucker did it!"

"Your turn," Carolina said, nudging Tex.

" _You're_ the Blue Team rookie," Tex retorted, but she was already reaching for the rest of her armor.

They'd figure out the rest later.

Right now, she was pretty sure that part of the base was on fire.

* * *

 **A/N: And that's the end! Hope you guys enjoyed!**


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